Winding Down the Day
by Stephanie3
Summary: Quatre recounts how the lives of the pilots revolved around a little cafe in the years following the war.
1. Winding Down the Day: Chapter 1

  


Winding Down the Day

  
_Stephanie_  
November 12, 2001

Part 1 **_Rating:_** [R] for language and minor drug use  
**_WARNING:_** Shounen-ai 1+3  
(Rating and warning applies to the overall story) 

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Not everything is written down in the history books. It is an old saying I had heard long ago, but had never given much thought to until embarking upon this collection of memoirs. For those of us who fought in the Eve Wars, a certain amount of pages are to be expected in our academic journals, in our popular fiction and in our poetry. 

For better or worse, those pages are thought by some to have been earned; fought for, paid for in blood and the God given right of all who sacrificed and died in the struggle for peace. Perhaps this is true, or perhaps it is something we, as a whole people, simply need to hear and believe in order to keep going in our daily tasks. Years ago I would have turned my head at such thoughts, and silently remembered the wars as they happened, as we fought them, in my own mind's eye, knowing the truth for what it was. Today, I cannot say that I truly understood such a truth. I cannot look back this day and tell you what was for the good and what was evil or to be despised. The fruit of those wars are only now being discovered and I stand ever amazed at my own thoughts at this strange fruit. This fruit, which for me, juxtaposed those ideals I held so tightly with that of my enemies. This fruit handed to me by him. Only an offering, nothing more or less.

In this chapter, I wish to recite a poem as taught to me by a man I met during the wars, but only grew to know and understand in the first few decades following the last battle for peace. He is not to be found in the text books. He is not to be remembered in the great epics of our time. He is footnoted only as a Gundam pilot during the two Eve Wars. He is in the little things - a turn of a phrase, a look, a lifestyle - that which shapes the things we are to become, but seldom seen. It is too little, too trite to be recorded, but is the essential building blocks for without such a foundation nothing would stand, or be worth standing for. 

He is ever with me, ever haunting my thoughts and my actions, and so too the lives of those who called him friend. When the rest of us are gone, his name will disappear completely despite our efforts to share with him our own small portion of immortality. The world has only a limited capacity for what it can remember.

Not everything is written down in the history books. Such thoughts are expressed only in our poetry and read after the generation in which is was written has passed. When it is again safe.

Listen:

Trowa Barton came to me three years after the Mariemaia uprising, or what was to be called the second Eve War. To the exact date, he arrived at my office on the L4 colony of my birth. 

He was a sight to see. Almost exactly how I remembered him, only taller. Not really noticeable since our proportionate sizes remained the same. All things being relative, there was no change at all you can say. Not physically. 

Trowa, never one to mince words, told me up front that he would like my help in a project concerning both he and his sister Catherine. He told me it would involve money, but not much considering my wealth. He would be grateful for my assistance if I chose to help him in such a matter. 

It was all very straight forward and to the point. His sister had a dream of one day quitting her work at the circus, which Trowa explained to me only had a limited life span of a few decades before they would have to quit anyway - if they were lucky - and opening a café of her own somewhere in either France or the United States. It was a moderate dream, nothing extravagant. The wages of circus performers, however, would only buy them enough food and clothing to live on, but not supply much in terms of a retirement savings. He wanted to give his sister her dream, but could not do so without help. He went on to say that he investigated the Preventors, but did not wish to work in a line that might leave Catherine without family.

Besides, he added, it too did not pay enough. Nor did any other job he was qualified to work that did not involve war or violence. He wanted none of that, even at the expense of his sister's dreams. There were other alternatives, and I happened to be the most promising one. He would of course pay me back before he or Catherine would see a profit. Honor prevented anything less than that. Trowa was merely being practical, and I never had a doubt that he had spent some time weighing his options.

"I wish you had come to me sooner, Trowa," I told him. "It's been three years since we've really talked."

"There have been letters," he countered. It was true. Trowa had indeed kept up a correspondence with me over the years in the form of letters. His traveling and long work hours with the circus made actual meetings and phone messages impossible. My own work with my family corporation did not make it easier, and the preparations for my wedding the year before had made me rather inaccessible. Still, I had to admit a disappointment when he was unable to attend the wedding. Of the pilots, only Duo showed and took on the role of best man. 

Trowa was on earth at the time, traveling with his job, and I suspect now that he could not afford a price of a ticket that was not paid for by the circus or scientists funding terrorist attacks. With the collapse of the economy during the first years of reconstruction, space flight was neither cheap nor easy. It shames me now that I did not think to send him a ticket. 

"Yes, there have been letters," I nodded in agreement. "You could have mentioned it in a letter." 

"It didn't seem right to ask you in a letter," he said. I thought on this for a moment. Coming to L4 had been a risk for him. It had certainly cost him a nice chunk of his savings to make it to my colony. This was more to him than following up on a dream of his sister's. 

"No, I guess not." I folded my hands behind my back and turned to look out my window, as was my habit with mulling over matters. "It's yours, you know," I said. "Anything you or the others would ever ask. It's yours."

He made not a sound and I turned back to see his reaction, if any. He remained standing in front of my desk expressionless, waiting, and in that moment I wish the desk were gone, it made it seem so impersonal, when before it was my security. 

"Would you like help in setting up the business, or would you just like the money," I asked.

He gestured to me with his palm extended out and said, "All your input and help, would be greatly appreciated." And I understood that it was not merely a matter of a business transaction for him, but an acceptance of friendship and an offer of his own in return. 

I stepped out in front of the desk and took his hand, accepting what I know was not something he gave away lightly. It took a little dignity to gain some. "I would not recommend France," I said. "The climate isn't right for new entrepreneurs. Perhaps the United States would be better. I know of a place that would offer a flavor of France and Spain, while still being thoroughly American."

Trowa clasped his hand around mine and shook it. "And where is that?" 

"The city of New Orleans," I said. "It's an odd place. The whole country, actually. You'll need to speak fluent English and they still haven't adopted the metric system. They aren't ones for change, but I guess they have a certain charm about them."

Trowa backed away and contemplated that for a moment. "I know," he said. "I've been there before, remember?" 

"Well, yes, but that was during the war, I don't recall you interacting with the local populations much," I reminded him in polite banter. 

"No. .. no, I suppose I didn't. We shall settle in New Orleans then," he said with a nod. His trust in my opinion was so complete in those early days. "I know English and I can learn their measurement system, I suppose." He sat down in the leather chair, crossing one leg over the other and placing his hands on his knee. "I think Catherine will like it."

"Have you given any thought to a name yet?" I asked, sure that Catherine had the actual café detailed down to the croissant recipe she would use. 

He nodded and smiled a little. Then he told me. If I agreed to help them with the financial end, Catherine insisted on naming the place after me. I think Trowa knew I would be bit self-conscious about it, so a name was chosen that would honor me, while not actually referring directly to me or my family. "We decided on Café Q," he said. "And I would like it if we could invite the other pilots to the grand opening." 

I smiled. "Of course we'll invite them! I insist!" 

"Good," he said.

"Have you seen any of the others since the war?" I asked. 

"Just Duo a few times," he replied. "He travels the Earth Sphere now with his art and. . . I think he might call it `social activism'. A push for a single world economy, I think."

I laughed a little. "Yes, I've heard about it. I printed this news clipping the other day." I picked up the paper from my desk and handed it to him. Trowa looked it over for a minute before handing it back. 

"I've never understood that sign he carries. What does he mean by `The last war virgin'?"

I shrugged and set the paper back down. "I'm not sure. I assumed it was some sort of American idiom. I suppose we can both find out once we get to New Orleans."

He nodded and stood. "Thank you," he said. "For everything." 

Christmas Eve, 199 AC, was to begin the next twenty-seven years of our friendship.

  


  


  



	2. Winding Down the Day: Chapter 2

  


Winding Down the Day

  
_Stephanie_  
November 12, 2001

Part 2 

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On the eve of the opening of the Café Q, we had all gathered to help with the last minute preparations. To my surprise, Wufei had accepted the invitation, if curtly, over the phone and agreed to be there. Duo, I was sure would come. Only Heero remained the mystery, as Relena was unsure of his whereabouts, though she promised to pass on the message to him when next they spoke. 

The afternoon started low key with a dinner and friendly conversation, mostly among Duo, Catherine and myself, with the occasional bickering between Duo and Wufei over what, or what not, constituted art. Having seen Duo's much publicized art over the television, due to his social activisim and special status as a former Gundam pilot, Wufei was of the opinion that Duo's work was a menace to society rather than art, and told him so over dessert. Duo's philosophic rebuttal on the nature of the aesthetic citing an interesting interpretation of Immanuel Kant, crashed and burned when Wufei cited Confucius and Plato as counter points and then proceeded to tell Duo where he could `stick' his art. It ended when Trowa wisely asked for the check. 

As the evening progressed, we turned our attention back to the preparations needed for the next day. We settled on stools at the bar counter of the café and engaged in random small talk before getting to the actual work that needed done.

"They say this is the most haunted city in the world!" Catherine laughed and placed a mug in front of each of us. She was truly enchanted with the city and all its funny little quirks and idiosyncrasies. But the `other worldly' aspect of New Orleans is what fascinated her the most. When the three of us had arrived in the city several months ago to choose the location of the café, she had taken us to all the sites marked on the map as `haunted.' Trowa had encouraged me to only nod and smile."And you know, last night Trowa claims to have seen a ghost himself. Isn't that **_great_**? We have our own tourist attraction here!" 

Trowa said nothing, but went about his business of making tea for us. We all waited for an explanation from him on the ghost, which never came. It was an old habit of his never to elaborate when anything extraordinary was mentioned of him. I never determined if this was due to some abnormally large streak of humility or just sadistic manipulation. Trowa, for all his quiet subtleties, was a magnificent showman and actor. I sometimes wondered if he used unsettling the rest of us as substitute entertainment when he wasn't with the circus. Whatever the case, we all wanted answers.

"Hot damn!" Duo slapped Trowa on the back and then put his arm around him. Trowa moved away and continued his work. "You've got a real live ghost in this place! You and Cathy should let the tour groups come through. It would certainly beef up the business here." He looked around the place and grimaced. We'll have to do something about the decor here though. . . Needs livened up, Tro. Looks like the ghost still owns the place."

I gave Duo a sharp look and then turned my attention back to Trowa, who still hadn't acknowledged Duo was in the same room. "Did you really see a ghost, Trowa?" I asked.

He turned around and looked at me for a moment, and then to Catherine. "Yes." 

Catherine shook her head and placed her hands on her hips. "I don't see why you need to be so hush-hush about it. I think it's great! And Duo has a point, it might be good for business."

"Don't forget the part I said about the decor," Duo added. "And I have a few art pieces that would go fabu--"

"Stop trying to pawn your monstrosities off on your friends, Maxwell," Wufei cut him off, "you're shameless." 

"_**What**_?" Duo's eyes widened. "What the hell are you talking about, **_I_** am a respected artist! I'm doing **_them_** a favor, buddy!" 

Wufei crossed his arms and looked over to me. "There will be little room for the ghost with the rate that ego is inflating." 

"Oh, _**bite**_ m--"

"SO, Trowa," I started before Duo could finish and get into a shouting match with Wufei, "what was the ghost like? I mean, what did it do?" 

Wufei gave a sharp `tsk' and shook his head. Trowa stared at him as he did so. "It's just local folklore," he said. "Trowa didn't really see a ghost. There's probably a story that comes with this place." 

Trowa cocked his head to the side and continued his gaze on Wufei. "No," he said. "I saw a ghost." He took the tea pot from the stove and began to pour the tea into Wufei's mug. A strong spiced aroma filled the air. Wufei would be the first of Trowa's test tasting victims. It was never a good idea to publically question Trowa. 

Wufei sniffed at the liquid in the mug and took a sip. He looked back up at Trowa with a sour face. "What is this?" he asked. 

"Chai. It's Indian tea." Trowa said.

"I know what Chai is, Trowa. I'm asking you what **_this_** is." Wufei pushed the mug across the counter toward Trowa. 

"Hn." Trowa picked up the mug and sniffed it. "What's wrong with it?" 

"Try going to the French market for your spices and not down the local super market isle," Wufei chided him. "I would think you'd know better than that."

"I **_told_** you, Trowa!" Catherine laughed. "You never listen to me." 

"I did." Trowa took the tea and spilled it down the drain. "There aren't any eastern spices at the market, just the hot ones from the Americas." 

"Hello?" Duo clinked his spoon against the mug in irritation. "Can we set aside tea time for a moment and finish the ghost story?" 

"I'm kind of interested in hearing the rest of this too." I admitted. 

"I told you," Trowa blinked as though he was amazed we hadn't heard him the first time. "I saw a ghost." 

"Well, yeah, Tro, but give the details here!"Duo insisted. 

"It was male. It walked around my bookcase." Trowa shrugged. 

"And. . .?"

"That's it." 

"He didn't say `hi', or tell you how you must avenge his wrongful death, or grab a book? Nothing else?" Duo pressed harder, squinting his eyes and leaning closer to Trowa.

Trowa shook his head. "No." Then he thought for a moment. "It just walked into the wall and vanished."

"Freaky!" At that point, Duo would take anything to make the story more exciting. It was important to Duo that all stories contained at least one element to make them worth listening to, before he embellished on them himself. He would always press until he got something and Trowa was always a challenge for him. Ironically, Trowa had far more patience with Duo than Duo had with him."You know, I think we should try to communicate with it and find out why he's here." 

"No, Duo," Trowa flatly stated. 

"What?"

"We're not holding a seance, Duo." 

"You know, Trowa, you were **_almost_** fun for a moment there. Almost. . ." 

Trowa gave him a cursory glance before turning back to the stove to put on another kettle of tea. 

"You know," Duo looked at me as though wounded by Trowa's dismissal, "I don't think I've ever met a person that can so thoroughly tell a person to `fuck off' without out ever uttering a single word."

"Do you say that to all the terrorists you meet?" 

We all turned our attention to the door, stunned by the familiar low monotone voice attached to a figure leaning against the door frame with his arms crossed. Heero Yuy. None of us had seen him in over four years. 

Duo's mouth hung open in shock, but he quickly recovered by some innate need to always display the facade of a cool exterior. "Nah. Your silences were more boring, like `get out of my way' or, `I'm going to use you for all the spare parts I can muster and then toss you over my shoulder like a used detonator.' Trowa's silences are far more colorful and condescending. `Fuck you,' `dipshit,' and my personal favorite, `tell me, did you slither out from the shallow end of the gene pool or is that mold on your brain being used for antibiotics?' See the difference? He's giving me that last one now, it's all in the eyes. Take a good look." 

Trowa shifted his glace from Duo to Heero and slightly bowed his head to him. "Heero." It was all he said. Not hello, or glad to see you again, only Heero's name before he returned to his work. 

After the initial surprise impact, I stood and walked over to Heero and extended my hand, which he took. "It's been a long time Heero," I said and smiled at him. "It's good to see you. I was hoping Relena would find you and give you the message." 

Heero nodded. "Hai. She did." He stared at me for a moment, and there was a softer look in his eyes than I remembered from the war. He seemed as if he hadn't a care in the world and he was just stopping by to catch up on old times. He was, I guess, and though it seemed strange it felt good. 

"Good," I said. I put my arm around him, a gesture I would have never considered doing during the wars, but it seemed right now. "Why don't you have a seat, Trowa's making tea for us. Chai, wasn't it?" I asked Trowa. 

"I poured it down the drain," Trowa bluntly said. "Darjeeling." He set a mug in front of Heero and turned back to me. "I thought it would be more to your taste, Quatre." 

"Do you have any coffee?" Heero asked. 

Trowa blinked. "It's a café." And I have to admit that Duo was right. You could have easily tagged one of Duo's colorful phrased to Trowa's words with the look he was giving Heero. He was so good at it, one wondered if he practiced at it, or acquired it after a lifetime of being disappointed with the human race. 

"I'd like coffee then," Heero said to our astonishment. I had thought he viewed coffee as a narcotic to be avoided. Trowa was the only one of us that lived on it. "I've developed a taste for it while working long nights in the Security department," he explained 

"So **_that's_** what you've been up to!" Duo interrupted. "Can you tell us anything you've done, or would you have to kill us later?" 

"Yes." 

"Cool, so what's the scoop?"

"I meant yes I would have to kill you." I think I saw something like a smirk on Heero's face and later asked Duo if that was what he saw. He said he had definitely witnessed something that resembled humor as well, and we both reflected on that for a while. The years of peace time had truly been good for Heero. 

"Bastard." Duo gave up in defeat, or perhaps it was just an attempt to seem disinterested. 

"What have I missed?" Heero asked. 

"In the past four years, or just tonight?" Duo drummed his fingers on the counter. 

"Just tonight."

Wufei set down a little pamphlet guide to New Orleans that he picked up on a rack as he entered the café and turned to face Heero for the first time that evening. "Earlier, to jump start our first day in this den of sin, we sat through an amazingly long winded speech given by Quatre on the value of friendship, Duo has threatened to fill the café with objects he insists on calling art, Trowa nearly poisoned us all with some concoction he claimed was Indian tea, Catherine announced that the café was haunted and Trowa admitted to seeing ghosts."

"Just one." Trowa dropped the tea bag into Wufei's mug and poured the hot water over it. 

"Sorry, Trowa," Wufei apologized with a nod and turned back to Heero. "**_A_** ghost. That's about it." 

"Sounds like I missed quite a bit." Heero stared into his empty mug and looked back up to Trowa in anticipation. Trowa ignored him and went over to Catherine to tell her something in private. 

"Not really." Wufei picked his pamphlet back up and pretended to be disgusted by the tourist attractions. 

"Well, now that the ole ball n'chain has let you out of the basement, you gonna stay among the living, Mr. Yuy?" Duo set his elbows between Wufei's and Heero's shoulders and leaned his head in, "Hmmm?" 

"Relena and I are not. . . together." Heero was quick to correct. 

"Oh, now, come on, Heero this is me you're--" Duo was abruptly cut off from speaking when he quite suddenly hit the floor. None of us actually saw what happened, but the culprit was obvious. 

"I don't remember permitting you to touch me, Maxwell." Wufei leered down at Duo, who only laughed back.

"Still the curmudgeon, Wufei. . ." Duo shook his head in admonishment. "What you need is tamed. . . or laid. Why don't you settle down and start a family. Hell, start a few!" 

"You sell a few paintings and you think you're Picasso." Wufei picked himself up from his stool and relocated next to me. 

"I was thinking. . ." Heero started. "Maybe we can go out tonight. . . have a drink." He seemed uncomfortable with his words, as though unsure of how to casually ask a group of friends out. 

Trowa stopped in front of him with a pot of coffee and poured it in his mug. "We have drinks here," he stated curtly. 

"I was thinking more of. . . adult beverages, Trowa." Heero stared up at him and for the first time that evening their eyes met, if only briefly. 

"Heero, it's called liquor, booze, alcohol--" Duo began to ridicule Heero's word choice, when both Wufei and I shot him glares. 

Trowa shook his head. "No. We're opening tomorrow, there is too much work to be done." He turned toward the rest of us. "If the rest of you would rather go, don't stay behind on my account." 

"Damn," Duo sighed, "I never thought I'd turn down a free drink from Heero Yuy, but I promised to help tonight." 

"Forget it." Heero said. "What needs done. I'd like to help." He took a sip of his coffee and set it back down dismissively. 

"What's wrong with it." Trowa backed up and looked down at the mug. 

"Nothing, Trowa. It's good coffee," Heero said. 

Trowa narrowed his eyes on Heero, obviously not believing his words. 

"It's just that. . ." Heero hesitated a moment and picked up the mug, tasting it contents again as if re-evaluating it. I swear in that moment I saw the same little smirk when he told Duo he would have to kill him. "Your coffee is usually stronger." 

Trowa continued to eye him for a moment and then nodded a little. "That is my personal coffee. This," he said, swiftly taking the mug from Heero's hand, "is for the customers." With that he poured the coffee down the drain, following Wufei's chai from earlier. "You want to help?" Trowa asked with a tone of menace in his voice.

"Yes," Heero nodded, clearly up to whatever challenge Trowa would throw his way. 

The rest of us remained quiet, stunned and engrossed by the animosity that seemed to be coming from Trowa. The two always seemed to be good friends, it was hard to imagine them upset with each other. 

"There are some. . . cookies. . . that need baked tonight. You can do that." Trowa threw down the gauntlet and waited silently for Heero's answer. 

"What kind," he merely asked. 

"Raspberry tart," Trowa replied. 

Duo gasped. 

"Oh, Trowa," Catherine laughed, "Heero doesn't have to do that, I was going to--"

"You'll be baking all night, Cathy," Trowa reminded her. "Heero can make the tarts. He wants to help." He paused for a moment and looked back at Heero. "He said he did."

Heero nodded. "I will make the cookies." 

Trowa nodded and turned back toward the kitchen. "I'll make new coffee," he said, and vanished behind the door. 

"Oh, I wouldn't drink that, Heero!" Duo warned. "He's got something fierce against you, man! What the hell did you do to piss him off?" 

Heero said nothing to Duo but turned to Wufei and me. "Are you going to help tonight?"

"Yes," I nodded. "Wufei and I were going to help set up this room. Polish the furniture and all the woodwork, that sort of thing. Duo and Trowa are going to take care of the courtyard." 

He nodded again. "Catherine. Do you have a recipe and baking supplies?"

"Um. . . yeah," she said in a manner that was frighteningly like Trowa. "Are you **_sure_** you want to do this?" she asked him again. "You really don't have to. I'm sure Quatre and Wufei could find work for you out here." 

"Baking will be fine," he said. "I'll come out and help them when I am done."

"Well, okay. But these are kind of tricky, just let me know if you need help." 

Heero nodded and followed her into the kitchen. 

* * *

Heero was wired.

He had been up all night baking cookies and fixing last minute odds and ends that needed fixing in the café. He said he couldn't sleep, so it would be better to keep busy and make sure everything would run smoothly for the opening of the Café Q. Multitasking was the key, he said. He ran around the café at light speeds, wiping up spills here or dusting a speck of dust there, all while checking on the food. He made sure to stir the soups at least every five minutes and check the oven to make sure the bread wasn't burnt on the bottom. He was certainly more worried over it than Trowa or Catherine seemed. If anything needed their attention, they would simply complete their task in a careful and efficient manner. There were no rushed movements as they went about their work, only the calm grace that made both of them excellent as performers. Heero, in contrast, was out of control. 

Wufei blamed Trowa, whom he claimed had kept Heero going the night before on his special blend of coffee. The coffee consisted of a super concentrate of espresso beans, which rivaled a neutron star in density, poured into a large mug. And that was it. It always smelled to me like geraniums, and seemed to have a kick like plutonium to whoever dare drink it. Except Trowa, who used it only as a means to jump start his day. Having it in the morning meant Trowa might bother to talk that day. For Heero, it meant he might dig a tunnel through the center of the earth to India for a direct link that would supply the café with the spices needed to make a decent chai. 

The rest of us kept out of Heero's way. 

The morning was slow, only a few customers here and there. I had begun to worry that not many would show. Catherine and Trowa had worked so hard getting everything ready, I didn't want the business to fail and send them back to the circus to work. 

Duo used the early morning to bring in some of his art work. He brough what he called his "Doll" collection. They portrayed what appeared to be Qupie dolls at various levels of decrepitation, all going about the tasks of daily living. It wasn't bad. Certainly not as bad as Wufei would have us all believe. It was just odd. And odd, so long as it wasn't devoid of all merit, was always a plus in the art world. That Duo was a former Gundam pilot certainly helped sales. When word got out that the Café Q hosted Duo Maxwell originals, people were sure to come to the café. Or so that was the hope. 

In the middle of all Duo's work, Trowa hung a print of Degas' famous "Melancholia" that he took from his apartment above the café. It didn't seem to fit with the rest of Duo's work, and since it was the only print hanging in the café, it looked like a fish out of water on the wall. He hung it next to Duo's most controversial piece of an armless Qupie doll with it's head caved in performing the act of oral sex on another headless doll. Wufei said the woman in the Degas print was depressed over having to be displayed along with Duo's work, which kicked off another round of arguments. Trowa ignored them and went about his business. 

Then around noon something happened. The Vice Foreign Minister, Relena Dorlian, along with Dorothy Catalonia and what seemed to be the entire World Nations Senate, walked through the doors. To break for lunch, she said. The Senate had been meeting in New York.

Trowa and Catherine greeted and seated them all, as though such things were normal and they waited on diplomats as a matter of course. They served them soups, salads and sandwiches made with croissants and other various freshly baked breads. They made them specialty iced coffees and teas, and served them with little cakes and cookies. 

But it was the raspberry tarts that **_really_** went over well. Relena had proclaimed them her favorite and had politely asked Catherine for the recipe, if it wasn't a family secret, which Catherine informed her that it wasn't and would gladly give it to her for no charge. 

Dorothy Catalonia, who was seated next to Relena, ignored the chatter and occasionally looked over to me with a hint of mischief in her eyes. Her tolerance for small talk, one could tell, was wearing thin. She picked up one of the raspberry tarts and turned it around as though marveling at the design. They were in the shapes of hearts. One layer of the cookie was coated with raspberry preserves, while the top layer cookie had the center cut out in the shape of a heart, so that the raspberry showed through. The top of the cookie was covered in pink icing with little red and white sprinkles on top. 

"Tell me, Miss Bloom," she said sweetly. "Did you do all this work yourself?" 

"Why no, actually," Catherine told her. "I had quite a bit of help in the kitchen."

"I see," Dorothy said. "Can you tell us who made these delicious cookies?" she said as she took a bite from one. She had been waiting, no doubt, to hear that I or Trowa had made the cookies. Perhaps to deliver us a minor embarrassment. She was clearly unprepared for the answer.

"I made them." The voice of Heero Yuy came through the kitchen door, followed immediate by him. He was carrying a tray of lemon poppy seed muffins and white chocolate chip macadamia cookies. 

Dorothy's eyes widened and her lips curled up in a large smile, clearly delighted by the turn of events. "My, my, Heero Yuy. You are **_certainly_** a man of many talents!"

"I'm glad you like them," he said unfazed, and went about serving the muffins and cookies to the guest. 

Trowa looked on from behind the counter and smiled. 

  


  


  



	3. Winding Down the Day: Chapter 3

  


Winding Down the Day

  
_Stephanie_  
November 12, 2001

Part 3 

* * *

  


  


  


The café ran smoothly ever since its opening day, thanks both to Relena's and Duo's help. But while they had managed to bring the customers in, it was the kind service and good food that Trowa and Catherine provided that kept the people coming back for more. 

In truth, I would have liked to have stayed in New Orleans with Trowa and Catherine and help run the café, but my duties to my family and the Winner corporation kept me glued to my desk most of the year. But every few months, despite whatever work load I had, I'd take a small break and leave the colony to see my friends. It was a pleasant surprise to find that Duo, Wufei and Heero had also made it a habit to visit Trowa, often times together. And so we fell into a routine of coordinating trips to talk over old times, new goals and occasionally bicker with each other. 

A little over a year after the café first opened, I made quite a discovery on one such trip. I went in the back pantry to retrieve some of the special stock tea Catherine kept for me when I saw them together. Heero and Trowa. Kissing. And rather passionately. I closed the door quickly and went to the kitchen to make my tea. I was so embarrassed for intruding on them... and for not noticing they were together before then. 

I guess I should have realized it earlier, but I didn't. Trowa's initial coldness toward Heero had seemingly melted away without explanation. It never occurred to me that there could be something more, really. They were just Heero and Trowa to me, and that was that. But the two ex-soldiers, it turned out, were capable of love, and in fact, were in love with each other. They weren't really over the top about it, but I suppose everyone but me caught on to them. I guess Heero's frequent trips to New Orleans tipped the others off, as he had no other real reason to be there. That and the fact that he always stayed in Trowa's little house above the café.

Trowa followed me back to the kitchen alone. I didn't know where Heero went, but I was grateful that it was just Trowa. I was always more comfortable around him. Heero would never laugh at me, but I think he might have been as uncomfortable as I was, and that would have just made it worse for both of us. Trowa always had an uncanny knack for knowing what each situation called for. 

"Quatre," he said to me. "Sit down. We need to talk."

"Oh?" I busied myself with the tea chest, trying to look like I was searching for a special flavor. I fingered through each one twice and shook my head. "You know, I think we're out of Darjeeling."

"I'll order more," he said. "Quatre, I think you should kn--"

"I mean the Earl Grey and English Breakfast are fine for the masses, but if you neglect the customers that have a bit of a _**finer**_ taste, well..." I shook my head in disapproval, "we might as well just serve orange pekoe to the Queen." I don't think I had the faintest idea of what I was talking about, I just rambled on and on about the tea. I was lucky Trowa had nearly unlimited patience. Nearly.

"Relena drinks coffee, Quatre," Trowa reminded me. "And she's not a queen anymore."

"Well, no. But it's the principle of the matter--"

"Quatre, shut up." He stared at me with those intense green eyes of his until they all but forced me on to the nearby stool. "Heero and I are lovers, Quatre. We've been together for nearly a year now. Are you okay with that?"

"Well... well, yes, of course, if that's what you want." I laughed and waved my hand in the air. "but the tea, Trowa... we need to--"

"Quatre." He moved in closer to me and held my head with both hands. "Try to follow what I'm saying. Heero and I are lovers. We've been together for nearly a year now. Are. You. Okay. With. That?"

"Well no!" I slammed my teacup down on the counter and winced as it began to rattle around the table. I hadn't meant to be that forceful. I laid my hand over the cup to stop it and continued to look down at is as I spoke. "I mean... I think it's great that you and Heero are together. I'm really happy if both of you are. It's just... Well, why didn't you _**tell**_ me this before? I would have liked to know before... well, before I walked in on you guys!"

Trowa stepped back and nodded. "Fair enough," he said, "but we weren't hiding it, Quatre. I thought everyone had figured it out by now." He shrugged and put his arm around me. "You know, until I saw the look on your face just now, I thought you knew."

"Well, how would _**I**_ know if you didn't tell me?" I demanded from him.

"The fact that Heero is always here visiting, that we disappear for long times together, that he still bakes those raspberry tarts on a regular basis... " Trowa listed the clues off for me. I was mortified at my own blindness. "I thought maybe two months ago when Duo asked if we were planning on having children, might have been a pretty good clue."

"Oh... oh dear... I remember him saying that." I gasped in embarrassed horror, covering my mouth. Trowa looked amused. "I thought he was just joking! I am a naive, clueless little man, aren't I?" 

Trowa laughed. "Well... "

"It's not funny, Trowa! I've been living with my head stuck in the sand... What else have I missed?'

Trowa just smiled and handed me a small tin box he took for one of the cabinets. "Try this tea. It's some new blend Catherine swears by for relaxing her."

"I feel so stupid." I hung my head and slouched down on a stool by the counter.

"I should have just told you. Don't feel bad." He then studied me for a moment and narrowed his eyes. "It doesn't bother you at all that Heero and I are both--"

"Homosexual?" I finished for him. "Oh, no... no. Not at all. I knew that years ago." 

"Hn?" Trowa's eyes narrowed on me. He was truly surprised that I had known about his sexual orientation for some time. "How did you know?" he asked.

"Well, for Heero, it was the way he never showed much of an interest in Relena or any of the girls at that school of hers, yet he still knew how to waltz. That was a big sign." Trowa blinked and just stared at me. I started laughing. I think I earned it. "No, I'm just joking."

"Quatre... " he turned from me and put a kettle of water on to boil for the tea.

"I don't know... it was just a feeling that he might be. I've never seen him show an interest in anyone, really. Except for you, maybe. Back when you were missing he made a big deal out of me trying to find you. He didn't carry on about it, or anything, but he made it a point to tell me I had to stay alive until you were found. I guess he was thinking about you even then."

"And now here I am making you tea." Trowa smirked at me. "You can rest easy in your grave." He always had a twisted sense of humor. It's amazing how time tempers so many things. I had nearly killed Trowa during the war. It was my fault he was missing to begin with, and yet years later we were able to talk about it so casually in conversation, when before I would break down in tears at the barest mention of what I had done. Trowa, with his odd sense of humor and timing, had finally managed to make me see that it was an event best left to the past. I think Trowa would have appreciated the irony of me out living him by so many decades.

"How did you know about me?" he asked. "I never thought of it, myself." He took the kettle from the stove and poured the boiling water into a mug from the pile of clean dishes. "After the war, I was just learning how to interact with people in ways that didn't involve either killing or protecting them." He handed me the mug and pushed the sugar and cream over to me. "There was no one that really interested me before." He shrugged. "And then there was Heero." He smiled shyly, blushed almost it seemed.

He looked at me and tilted his head. "So how did you know?"

"I don't know."I shrugged and placed my hand over my heart. "Just that whole empathy thing, I guess. There was nothing overt." I sipped at the tea and added more sugar. It was awful, to tell you the truth. Some fruity peach tea. Catherine always liked the fruity herbal type teas. Tea should always come from a leaf, in my opinion. Not a fruit.

"After the war when I used to sit back and wonder what each of you were doing," I continued. "I just couldn't imagine you happily married with some woman and raising kids. I couldn't see you running around with lots of women like Duo, either. And I couldn't see you alone, you're too wonderful a person to be alone. It just seemed to fit that you'd share your life with another man. And it's perfect that it would be with Heero, because he deserves someone nice like you." 

He stood behind me with his hands on my shoulders and kissed the back of my head. "I've always loved you, Quatre Raberba Winner," he whispered in my ear. "Drink your tea and then get yourself ready. Heero and I are taking you all out for dinner."

"Trowa... does... everyone know?" I asked him sheepishly. Being the last to figure it all out doesn't help the ego much.

"Yes, Quatre. Sorry."

"Even, Wufei? He figured it out too?"

"Yes, he did, Quatre." Trowa then smiled at me and pulled me up from the chair. "He was the one that told Duo, actually. Go get ready."

I walked a few paces toward the stairwell and then turned back to him. "Wufei _**told**_ Duo? Duo didn't know first?"

"No." He stood there watching me with his arms folded. "It was about seven months ago. You were on an extended business trip to L1 and couldn't make it here." 

"Oh, yes. I remember that," I nodded.

"Duo was flirting with Heero most of the night," Trowa continued. "Wufei finally pulled him over and told Duo he had no dignity for flirting with his friend's partner."

"What did Duo do then?" I asked. Dumbly, I might add. 

"He started flirting with me instead. Go." He picked up the tea I had left on the counter and handed it to me as he pushed me toward the stairwell.

"Well, I guess I feel better then," I said as I began walking up the steps. "I mean, if Duo had to be told, then maybe I'm not so bad... " I turned around to look at Trowa again. He was still sporting an amused look and I suddenly wanted to laugh. It was so good to see him like that. I guess I didn't mind so much if he laughed at my expense. During the wars, I don't think I ever saw him smile once. In those days, he rarely showed any emotion at all, yet there was always a heaviness that proceeded his presence. But since the day he first stepped into my office to talk about the café, he was somehow different. Of the five of us, he remained the quietest, but it was as though the air was lighter when he was around. It was as though his whole soul had been lifted up and freed from whatever it had been that kept him pinned to the ground for most of his life. Whatever that burden was, it no longer seemed to weigh on him, and I guess that is all that mattered.

"No," he said to me, "you're not so bad." And then he smiled.

  


  


  



	4. Winding Down the Day: Chapter 4

  


Winding Down the Day

  
_Stephanie_  
November 12, 2001

Part 4 

* * *

  


  


  


I remember one year we all gathered together at the back room of the café to talk, as it had become our custom when all five of us happened to be in town together. That night, however, there was a disturbance out in the main dining room. A man was yelling at Trowa's staff, demanding to speak to the owner. Trowa excused himself from our table to attend to the matter. I remember peeking out from the door to make sure everything was alright. The man was actually a young boy... a gutter punk probably strung out on a multitude of drugs. After the war, there was a lot of that. Poverty, hunger, disease, homelessness, they all ran rampant in the first decade following the Eve Wars. Many of the old and young alike had turned to alcohol and drug addiction. 

Trowa never turned a hungry mouth away. The streets of New Orleans were ridden with the dispossessed. The buskers playing and singing, the young children tap dancing for small change, the tarot readers, the chess players, the prostitutes, the pimps, the gutter punks, the winos, the tour guides... From the filthy rich to the desolate poor, they roamed the streets together. It was often difficult to tell them apart. And Trowa fed them all: the rich and the poor, whether they paid or not. The rule was that the non-paying customers must stay in the back of the café behind the brick wall of the courtyard, out of the sight of the paying customers. Trowa had the alley way fenced off from public view so that the people could eat in peace without the public gawking at them. They were allowed to eat as much as they wanted, but they must never bother the people paying for service. The young man causing the commotion up front now objected to the rule it seemed. 

His head was completely shaven and he wore a beat up brown leather jacket with old Oz insignias up and down the arms. His eyes, like so many of the poor of the city, had deep circles under them and were sunken into his face. His ears were so heavily pierced, it looked as though they were made completely of metal. Needles were sticking out from his nose and cheeks so that he resembled a pin cushion. 

He was demanding to the server that he be allowed to sit up front, waving a twenty dollar bill in the air and announcing that he was a paying customer and therefore deserved to sit up front with the rest of the human beings. 

He was not a frightening spectacle, so much as a pitiful one, yet still I feared for Trowa when he went out to confront the man. One never knew when a scene could turn violent. 

But Trowa... he calmly slipped his arm around the boy's shoulder and talked to him quietly for a moment before walking outside with him. I couldn't hear what he said, but he had obviously calmed the man down. I turned back to the others to make my report.

"'It looks like he has it under control. He's probably taking the kid to the back to get a hot meal now,' I told them."

Wufei just crossed his arms and scowled. "He shouldn't be doing this..." he said in a huff, and not for the first time.

"Ah, come on, Wufei, what do you mean? He's doing a good turn!" Duo countered, also not for the first time. The two of them talked on the topic of Trowa's philanthropy quite a bit. "And really, the guy had a point. If he had the cash, he had every right to be in there eating with the rest of the paying customers. I think we need to stop shielding people from the harsh reality of life already. They're not going to fucking wither if they fall under the shadow of the street folk."

"That's not the point, Duo, and you know it!" Wufei said pointing his tea spoon at Duo. "The people are taking advantage of Trowa's and Catherine's generosity! I don't care what the upper crust thinks of Trowa's back house business, but these people have started to cross lines. At first I thought there was no harm to him giving leftover handouts to the poor, but then they kept coming and bringing their friends. Now they all come for a free handout! And he and Catherine tend to them on their own, always buying quality meat for stews. He gives _**them**_ the same stuff he gives to the paying customers, and do you know I've sometimes heard them complain? It's _**free**_ and it's _**good**_, yet they still complain! People have learned nothing from the wars we've fought... 

"And do you know that Trowa has not raised the prices since he opened the café six years ago?" he went on. "Not a single penny! His own cost goes up, but he will not change with the times. And then he gives his food away for free to those ingrates. You need to talk to him, Quatre. He's going to drive the café into bankruptcy."

"Is that true, Quatre?" Duo turned to me alarmed. "You wouldn't let him go bankrupt, right? I mean, none of us would, but you... You could feed the whole Earth Sphere prime rib for all eternity without going bankrupt..."

"Well, no Duo, I couldn't really do--" I started to tell him I didn't really have the resources to feed the whole Earth Nation, but Wufei interrupted.

"That's not the point, Duo! Trowa is being taken advantage of and it's going to drive him out of business. It needs to stop! Quatre should not have to bale him out, the café does a good business."

"Well, no, no... it's not that bad, Wufei," I informed him. He was really only looking out for Trowa's well being. "Financially, he's not in any real trouble. In fact, he paid off the loan money for the start-up costs last year. He's not making much of a profit, but he's not in debt either. I think he's doing just fine."

Wufei shook his head in disapproval. "Trowa needs to think more about his own needs. He could have a whole chain of restaurants by now if he wanted them. He could at least hire more people to help with the maintenance of the day-to-day work here. He always looks tired. He's too thin. He--"

"Yeah, he _**always**_ looks tired and too thin, Wufei!" Duo agreed with him. "Since the first day we met him, he looked like he could use a year's membership to a spa. You want him to buy a chain of cafes now? He'll waste away to nothing if--"

"He's happy," Heero had finally spoken up. I was a little relieved. Wufei and Duo both meant well, but sometimes their arguing could make one weary. Heero would have none of it though. I can't believe I missed how in love he was with Trowa before that moment. "If he wants to spend his time feeding the entire city paté and caviar from his own wallet, I'm not going to stop him." He then narrowed his eyes at both Duo and Wufei and stared at them with his intense gaze. "He's happy. Leave it at that."

"Well yeah man, that's what I was saying!" Duo smiled smugly at Wufei. "He's happy and he's doing a good thing."

"You know," I said, deciding to change the topic and entertain them in Trowa's absence, "it's not just the poor he feeds for free. Monsieur Genet often gets away without paying his bill."

"The French Senator?" Heero asked.

"Um-hum," I nodded. "He comes in here quite a bit. He claims New Orleans is 'the only good French town left in all of the United States,'" I quoted verbatim, having heard the speech of the old buffoon a few dozen times over the years. "He runs the poor servers ragged and then complains about the food. Trowa and Catherine are used to him now though. They just smile, nod, and tell him the food is on the house."

"Hn..." Heero smiled in conspiracy with me. "I know of Monsieur Genet from working in Relena's Cabinet. At the World Nation Senate he's always in disagreement with everything until he's asked to submit his own opinions. Then he has none."

"You know," I said, "I hear 'Genet' is not his real name, or that he's even a real Frenchman. Do you know anything on that, Heero?"

Heero nodded and moved his chair closer to the table. "He's not really French, but he brags to the council that he is a descendant of the French author Jean Genet."

"Jean Genet? Get out,"Duo laughed. "The Thief's Journal, Jean Genet? The born of a prostitute, gutter snipe, champion of the criminal element and underclass, Jean Genet?"

Heero nodded again. 

Duo propped his feet up on the table and fiddle with a deck of cards that were had been laid out. "He doesn't have a clue, does he?"

Heero merely shook his head. "He thinks it sounds more distinguished while it gains him the vote of the commoner. One of the other Senators researched into Monsieur Genet's family history. His father and mother were both Slavic. They moved to France while he was still a child. He later changed the his name to Genet after his parents died."

"And what was their family name before?" Wufei asked.

"Ottilia," Heero replied.

"That doesn't sound so bad." Duo said. "I wonder why they changed it."

Heero leaned in closer to the table. There was a gleam of amusement in his eyes. "It means 'cabbage,'" he said, and then he sat back in his seat and folded his arms. 

Duo laughed out loud and was nearly rolling on the floor. "Oh _**that's**_ poetic justice!" 

Even Wufei was laughing at Monsieur Genet's darkest secret. "Perhaps this is why he's such a bitter man,"he said. "Still, he should not get away without paying his bill. Trowa should--"

"Leave things as they are," Trowa completed for him as he strode back in the room. "The man lives with enough shame in his life."

"Hn. Not enough if he hasn't learned to pay his bills yet," Wufei snorted. "I think the Senator has more than enough money to pay for his soup and coffee." He paused for a moment and looked directly at Trowa. "Especially at these prices. Don't you agree? Or maybe it's time for him to sit out back with the rest of the non- paying 'customers.'"

"Oh _**now**_ you're talking, Wufei!" Duo sprang out of his chair and put his arm around Trowa. "What do ya think? Next time he comes in we tell him," Duo dropped his tone to that of a serious nature. "'Monsieur Cabbage, we know you are a proud man. Therefore, we would not _**think**_ of forcing you to sit with the paying customers. We know you would be much more comfortable sitting out back with your own kin. Monsieur Cabbage, your great ancestor Jean would be _**so**_ proud!'" Duo put both hands on Trowa's shoulders and looked him in the eye. "I only ask that you let me be the one to tell him," he said, dramatically crossing his right hand over his chest. Duo really liked to push the drama when he could. "You know I live for my art."

Trowa pushed Duo aside and sat down at the table. "No," he said, and then poured himself some coffee from the pot on the table. He drank it down straight and then took out a pair of playing cards. "I'll deal," he said. And that was that.

  


  


  



	5. Winding Down the Day: Chapter 5

  


Winding Down the Day

  
_Stephanie_  
November 12, 2001

Part 5 

* * *

  


  


  
About six months later I had made it back to earth for a few weeks of vacation. I spent two of those weeks in Arabia visiting the Maguanacs, and then made my way to New Orleans to spend the rest of my time with Trowa and Catherine at The Café Q. It was late summer there, and rather humid. Not the best time to vacation in a tropical environment, but I made it a point to always see Trowa when I got a chance to go to Earth.

The café was teaming with customers, as always. Catherine greeted me with a hug and directed me out back to the courtyard where Trowa was taking a break and drinking an ice coffee. She leaned close to me and whispered in my ear "Talk some sense into him, Quatre."

"Hn?" I turned around and looked at her with concern. "Is something wrong, Catherine? What's going on?"

"Just talk to him, please," she pleaded. "You'll find out in enough time." She shook her head and went back up front to help the staff.

I walked over to where he was sitting at a table in the corner of the courtyard. He was still in habit from his training to sit with his back to the wall. The top of the brick wall was laced with spiked rod iron and the surface of the brick was covered in jagged glass. It was an old practice of the French during the colonial days of America. To keep people out or to keep them in, I don't remember which. Probably both. Trowa liked it though. Some sort of ivy with a bright pink flower grew over the brick wall adding a sharp contrast to his normal earth-colored clothing. I remember he wore a green short-sleeved shirt and khaki shorts that day. Actually, he wore variations of those colors everyday, so it's not a real stretch for my old memory, but for some reason I can see him perfectly. . . as if I were there now. 

He set his coffee and newspaper down and looked up at me with a smile. "I didn't know you would be here today."

"I didn't either, actually," I said. "I got tired of the desert, so I decided to join you in the swamp a bit earlier. I hope that's okay with you."

"That's fine. I'll have Heero set up the guest room later."

"Heero?" I raised an eyebrow at that. Apparently more had happened while I was away that time than anybody had bothered to tell me in mail or phone messages. I thought maybe it was what Catherine had wanted me to talk to Trowa about, but I couldn't see why Heero's more permanent presence would bother her or be bad for Trowa.

"Yes, he has to earn his keep somehow, so he's doing house chores." He smiled slightly and I could tell whatever arrangement they had come to it, amused Trowa greatly.

"Is this permanent, Trowa? Has Heero moved in with you?"

Trowa nodded, still smiling. "Yes, he has. He quit his position in Relena's cabinet, if you can believe it. He still works for her as the senior computer programer and analyst, but he claims he can do that job from anywhere," Trowa shrugged, "so he's staying here." He leaned in close to me and pulled the newspaper up to cover our faces. "Between you and I, I think he must be designing private video games for her, or something trivial like that. I can't imagine he'd be able to work with top level information from his laptop."

"Well, no. Probably not," I agreed. "This is great news though, Trowa!" I said smiling at him. "Now you have each other full-time, you must be happy about that!"

Trowa set his paper down and looked serious. "To be honest with you, Quatre, he's starting to get on my nerves. It's only been a little over a month and I feel. . ." He looked at me with a trace of guilt on his face, "smoothered." He looked down at his coffee and began turning the glass around. "I love him and I'm glad he's here but. . . well. . . Now he's **_always_** here."

That must have been what Catherine was talking about, I reasoned. Heero moved in and Trowa was having second thoughts about the arrangement. "Trowa," I told him, "this is to be expected in the beginning. You need some time to get used to each other's habits, that's all," I chuckled. 

"He likes to wake up when I get up. . . He likes to get the paper for me in the morning and eat breakfast together," he said with a grimace. "It's like an invasion. I've. . . always been alone for that. . . It's sacred time. That's the only time I have to think about things in private. I don't want to give that up. Does that seem selfish of me?"

"A little, yeah," I laughed, "but I understand. I was the same way when I first married Anna. She wanted to be a part of everything I did. Believe me, time tempers that. Soon, he'll be looking for opportunities to take a breather from *you* and you'll start wondering what it is you did wrong."

"Really? You really think it's all just the newness of it? Everything else is wonderful. . ." he said with a sigh. "Dinners in the evening, walks by the duck pond at Audubon, and the nights. . ." He smiled a little again and sat back in his chair. He even gave that little blush he had come into habit with after confessing to me his love for Heero. "It's just. . ."He frowned as he said it. The poor thing was feeling so much guilt. "Some mornings I want to bludgeon him to death with his laptop."

"Oh, Trowa!" I laughed out loud. "Well, as extreme as that sounds, you've never been a morning person. Back during the war, the rule was not to approach you in any way, shape or form before you had at least two cups of coffee in you. And even then it never hurt to offer you whatever form of solid food we had at our disposal before talking about anything significant."

Trowa frowned again. He lifted his glass and tilted it back against his lips to slide what was left of the melted ice down, but I knew the cover for what it was. "I'm really that bad?" he mumbled through the ice.

"Worse. I'm sugar coating it because we're friends." I took his hand in mine and patted it in reassurance. "Heero knows what you're like. Maybe he's a little over zealous now because it's all so new for both of you and he wants to show you that he loves you. You know how Heero can go a bit overboard when he's on a mission. He wants things to be perfect when you prefer comfortable. Have you talked to him about this at all?"

He looked at me for a moment and shook his head. "No. . . I didn't want him to think I didn't want him here. I feel bad. . ."

I rolled my eyes. Why do people always make their lives more difficult than they have to be? It's something I never understood, even if I did it myself sometimes. "Trowa, how is he suppose to know you want him to ignore you in the morning if you haven't told him? If you act as if you like it, he's going to think you want him there. And I thought you were always the logical one," I sighed and shook my head at him. Had it been anyone other than him, he would have out right told us we were being stupid. "Talk to him, Trowa."

"Hn." Trowa sat back, seeming to think on that for a moment. "I guess tonight after he gets back from the court house."

I blinked, not sure if I heard him right. "Court house? What is he doing there?"

"Trying to get Duo out of the local lockup," he said casually as he picked the newspaper back up and began to read.

It was a good thing I was not drinking anything at the time, as I nearly choke at his words. "Duo is in **_prison_**?"

Trowa nodded and flipped the page. Of all of us, it was always Trowa that was least affected by Duo's antics. He believed that it was all a part of knowing Duo. I don't think he would have been surprised if Duo one day sprouted wings and flew away. "Yes, but I wouldn't worry. With all the press this is getting, I doubt they'll keep him there long."

"Press?" I queried.

"Animal rights activists. It's a big issue here now." Trowa turned the paper towards me and pointed out the headline. Sure enough, a group of activists were standing in the front lawn of the court house holding up signs that read `Save Duo Maxwell!'and `Duo Maxwell: Endangered Species' and `That Last War Virgin'. Right below that photo there was another of a few of his detractors. One held up a picture of a donkey with its back end in full view and a picture of Duo's head replacing that of the donkey's.

"Trowa. . . I might not really want to know this. . . but. . . what did Duo do this time?"

Trowa set the newspaper down again to looked at me for a long moment before answering. "They took him in for stealing mules."

"**_What_**?" It was AC 207, mule theft was not a common crime.

"He wasn't really stealing them, he was just trying to free them." He shook his head a little and sat back in his iron rod chair. "And it wasn't Duo that started it this time. It was me," he said, and waited for me to respond to that little bomb.

I was quiet for a moment, trying to wrap my head around the thought of Trowa stealing mules. Or freeing them rather... Either were odd for him. Trowa didn't normally act out in ways that would draw attention to himself. "You. . . were stealing horses. . . ?"

"Mules. And I was rescuing them, not stealing them," he corrected me, "from the carriage drivers. You know how they line up all long Decatur by Jackson Square?'"

I nodded, rather speechless at the moment, and waited for him to continue.

"It's August," he said. That was all he said. He looked at me and waited for me to piece things together. But I was still working out how Duo was in prison now because Trowa was freeing the mules.

"Can. . . you give me a little more information, Trowa?" Now it was falling into place. Catherine was upset about Trowa and the mules.

"Those mules are old, Quatre. It's the middle of August in New Orleans, they shouldn't be pulling carriages in this weather. Duo stopped by a few days ago and we went for a walk. This poor mule was limping along the road pulling some tourists in a carriage. I don't know what gets into to people that they can't see it's too hot for **_anything_** to be pulling their pathetic lives around, but they don't. They're blind to everything, Quatre." He looked up at me and I saw real anger in his eyes. Trowa was not one to display emotion freely, much less anger, but it was setting off sparks in his eyes now. "What Wufei did was wrong, but I can understand it." He was referring, of course, to Wufei's part in the Mariemaia uprising back in AC 196. "Sometimes I think it would have been better had they succeeded in Operation Meteor."

"You don't mean that, Trowa!" I was shocked by what he had said. Trowa had risked everything to stop Dekim Barton. He infiltrated their ranks and was nearly killed by Wufei for what he did. And in our last battle, it was Trowa that called out the order not to kill any of Mariemaia's soldiers. He had said on many occasions that he had enough of fighting and killing. . . that the people must be protected because it was the right thing to do, not because of orders or duty to rules. He had come very far from the early days of the first war when he believed duty was little more than following orders. It was difficult to hear him talk as though killing off the majority of humanity was a good thing.

Trowa merely shrugged. "I do, Quatre."

"Then why do you put yourself through so much trouble to do *any* of this?" I shouted at him as I pointed to the far wall, where behind it the homeless gathered for their meal. "Why not just tell them to get the hell out and find food in a garbage pail, if that's how you really feel?"

Trowa stood and folded his newspaper up. "Calm down."

"You sit there and calmly drink your coffee as you tell me Duo is in prison for something **_you_** did and then spout off on how humanity should all just curl up and die. And now you want me to just nod and smile and be polite as always? No!" I stood and shook my finger at him. "Don't tell me to calm down. I'm irritated. I'm irritated by the way you just sit back sipping your coffee and look all cryptic! If you have something to tell me, then tell me and stop making me guess what goes on in that head of yours. For all the years we've been friends, you at least owe me that!"

"Come with me." Trowa said in reply and then turned to walk back into the café.

I followed him back into the café and into the kitchen. I had half a mind to leave, but then I really couldn't justify being that upset with him. Trowa was always a little odd and prone to depressions, and then what Catherine said was worrying me, so I stayed. 

To tell you the truth, I probably would have stayed even if I was really angry. It wouldn't have been polite to leave."

"I made you angry," he said. There was a sort of apology in his tone, and I felt my agitation begin to dissipate. 

"Only a little," I admitted.

"I can't help, how I feel, Quatre." He reached into the fridge and handed me a bottle of one of the ice teas his café kept in stock. "I wish I could be the optimist like you, or see the good within the bad like Duo, or rise above it all like Wufei. But I can't." He took my hand and led me up the steps into the apartment he and Heero kept above the café. It was much cooler there, and no doubt he took me there to get out of the heat. 

"But just think about that boy you helped the last time I was here." I leaned up against the wall and folded my arms. Trowa stared blankly at me. "You know, the one that was ranting and raving." He still showed no sign of recognition and it occurred to me that he must deal with that sort of disturbance on a daily basis. "The one with the pins in his head and all the piercings." I added for clarification. He nodded finally and just shrugged. "I would have been too shocked to really do anything about him." I continued. "Most people would have called the police. But not you." I shook my head. "No, you slid you arm around him and talked to him like he was a valued and prized customer. You treat everyone you meet with the same dignity. You can't hate humanity and show it **_that_** much respect."

He looked at me for a moment and then sighed. His eyes were drawn and sad, and suddenly he appeared very tired. He sat down on the edge of the couch, placing his elbows on his knees and propped his head up on the backs of his hands. "Oh, Quatre. . . All I saw was someone who was going to end up face down in the Mississippi in a few days. I don't love them, Quatre. I don't even like them. But I feel sorry for them. For everyone. Even Monsieur Genet makes me feel sad. I do what I can not to contribute to all the rotten things out there. . . but it's not out of love. It's pity. . . empathy maybe. I can remember waiting for death at a time in my life. I remember the loneliness and thinking there was nothing good in this world. . ." He paused for a moment and braced the back of his head with his hands. He looked so miserable. Almost guilty. "For many of the people that come here, I'm the nicest person they've met." And it was then that I saw something that I had never before, nor ever since, witnessed from this man. There was tear. And then another. He looked me in the eye and said in a soft voice, "And I don't even like them. How sad. . . How very sad. . ."

I sat down next to him and leaned forward on the edge of the couch in the same position he was. I didn't really know what to say or how to comfort him. Most of all, I wasn't even sure if he wanted it. The best thing, I had reasoned, was to just be there. 

I changed the subject. 

"Tell me what happened with Duo, Trowa. Why is Heero trying to get him released from prison while you're sitting here with me?"

"Oh that," Trowa dismissed it with a wave of his hand. He sat back in the corner of the couch and curled his legs under him. "I started to unhook the mules that were tied to the hitching posts. I'm not sure why I acted on it that particular day and not before. Maybe it was my mood. . . Or that it was so damn hot and humid." He sighed a little. "I had issued numerous complaints before, but this was the first time I really acted. Duo stopped me. I was a bit surprised that he would, it seemed like something he would approve of, but then he told me to let him do it. I think he was protecting me. . . But he said I needed to do the real work of helping the animals, while he took care of the PR." Trowa smiled. "He also said he needed the publicity as people were starting to forget him. So I stepped aside and let him do it, and he got carted away."

"That's it?" I asked him. The whole affair seemed a bit too sedate to have Duo involved, but then that was how Trowa told most stories.

"You know Duo," Trowa shrugged, "he always does things in extremes. I'll leave the story for him to tell after Heero gets him released. My vocabulary is far too limited to do it justice."

"Why do you think he has to be so extravagant?" I wondered aloud. 

Trowa laughed. "It's how he knows he's alive, Quatre. It's just a little badness to shake us all up and let us know we're alive too. He's mostly harmless."

"Hn. Mostly. One day he'll get himself into something he can't get out of, and then where will he be?" I posed that question to him, knowing already that he had an answer to it. Not that I'd accept it.

"I doubt it," he replied. "People like Duo always have a way out. There is always an alternative to giving up and accepting fate. People get into the messes they get into, because they accept the rules that they break as the rules of life. But people like Duo don't break them, because they never really believed in them in the first place. When you cease to be bounded by the rules, there are an infinite amount of alternatives that don't include a prison term."

"And you really believe this?"

"I'm just explaining to you why Duo is so `extravagant'. You know the Degas I have in the café?"

I looked at him confused for a moment at the abrupt change in subject and nodded. "Yes, it's one of my favorite prints in the café."

"It's not a print of the Degas," he said.

"No? Did Duo paint a replica for you? I didn't think that was his sort of thing," I said, thus confirming my status as eternally naive when it came to judging the innocence of my good friends.

"No, Quatre. It's not a replica. It's a Degas."

I was more confused by his words and wasn't sure what he was trying to get at. "The one of the woman looking sad? `Melancholia', isn't it? I thought Duo gave you that a few years ago."

"He did. It's a Degas."

"I'm. . . not sure I'm understanding you."

"A few years ago a Degas exhibit visited the New Orleans Museum of Art. It travels here every so many years because Degas vacationed here once. . .or maybe he had family here. . . something like that. So before the exhibit left, Duo saved that painting for me."

I blinked. Then I blinked again. Then I asked for clarification. Something had to be sailing right over my head. At least that was what I had hoped. "You're telling me that a **_Degas_** is sitting in the dinning area of your café?"

"Yeah. Duo gave it to me." And that's all he said. Just like that. Duo gave it to him. 

"Trowa! My God, do you even realize how much trouble you could be in if someone found out about it!"

"No one knows, Quatre. Duo was careful when he replaced it."

"How? I mean. . ." I stumbled over my words not sure what to say or how to phrase it. My best friend had just confessed to being an accomplice to a major felony with my **_other_** best friend, and my mind was in utter chaos trying to assess the situation and determine what I should think about first. "Duo. . . how . . . how could he just waltz in and. . . leave with a piece of art like that?"

Trowa merely shrugged. "I didn't really ask him how he did it. He's a trained terrorist, I'm assuming he's had tougher assignments than this in the past. We could all pull it off if we wanted to, Quat."

"But.. . but. . .a Degas. . .I mean. . . and then he just gives it away. . .**_why_**?" I was in a daze. One floor below me hanging on a wall was several million dollars worth of stolen art. The wall of a simple little coffee house. My mind raced with all the millions of ways the painting could get damaged down there. At least Trowa had banned smoking inside the establishment, but still. . .

"That I can answer," he said. "He asked me what I wanted as a gift for opening the café and I just asked him to steal me a nice piece of art."

"You **_asked_** him to steal it for you!" I believe it was that Trowa had asked Duo to steal the painting that astounded me more than anything else. I could see Duo stealing it. It was outrageous and scandalous and right up Duo's alley of mischief. I can even see him giving the painting to Trowa and Trowa accepting it. . . He accepted everything else Duo did, why not stealing a priceless piece of art? But **_asking_** Duo to steal it for him. My mind wasn't ready for that yet. 

"Not that particular piece, but--"

"Trowa! My God, have you lost your **_mind_**? You have a stolen Degas sitting in your café and you **_asked_** for it!" 

"It's not that big of a deal, Quatre. It's not like it's a Da Vinci or Picasso. I would have liked Monet's London Bridge, though. But I guess I shouldn't be choosey."

"Oh, you **_have_** lost your mind! You can go to prison, Trowa! And Catherine and I are business partners with you, we can be associated with it! And Heero, did you think of **_him_** at all?"

"Calm down, Quatre. No one is going to prison." He was as calm as he always was, while my own mind was nearing meltdown."Duo replaced the art and no one was the wiser. And no one is going to walk into my café and think I really have a Degas sitting on the wall."

"It's **_stolen_** Trowa! That's wrong just wrong! That belonged--"

"To a museum that hasn't missed it for almost a decade now. Quatre, it's just art. Degas is dead, I'm sure he doesn't mind who owns it now."

"Why couldn't you just commission Duo to make you something new? Did you have to encourage him to go out and steal you something? My God, Trowa, I don't understand you at all!."

"No. You don't, I guess. You don't understand either of us very well. Duo is a thief, Quatre."

"He **_was_** a thief," I corrected. 

"No. Duo **_is_** a thief." Trowa countered. "He steals things. That's what thieves do. He was happy to do it, Quatre. It made him feel good to go into that museum and pull off that trick. Art is a living thing. You're cultured, you should know that. It is the highest flattery to the artist's work to have it stolen."

"I--"

"You know what Duo did upped the value of this Degas, and created a new piece of art in the forgery. When they finally figure it out in a century or so, the forgery will probably be worth more than the Degas is now. But that's not why I've hung it in the café. I don't even like Degas. I hung it there because it is the product of a greater work. It's a Duo Maxwell special. **_That's_** why it's there. He put more work and skill into stealing that painting than Degas put into painting it. That's the art, Quatre."

"Trowa. . . I. . . I don't know what to think about this. . . It's. . .a bit much for one day."

"Quatre. . ." We're not bound by the same laws anymore. The war freed us from the rules of this place. There isn't anything more I could possibly do that could be worse than what I did as a soldier."

"Trowa, I--"

"No. Listen. We have been liberated in the most extreme way a human can be liberated. We killed and we did so on a regular basis. I've killed thousands, Quatre. It really doesn't matter why or what belief system I held. I did it. I killed them. Many of them were innocents, caught up in the same madness that you and I were. But. . ." He hesitated for a moment, and I could tell he wasn't quite sure he should say the rest. He did though. "Their deaths set me free in a way," he confessed. "When I realized that I couldn't sink much lower in life, the boundaries began to melt away. I didn't have to kill because I was ordered to kill. I could stop. I could walk away from it if I wanted. When that realization hit, the rest of the rules fled with it. I fell after that, Quatre. And it felt good to finally let go of everything I had held to before. Logic, order, structure. . . those things aren't real. They're just things that other people made up and forced the rest of us to follow." 

"You worry too much," he continued. "You need to let go without the fear of falling, and then you'll discover what I did. Falling isn't so bad."

"Trowa," I shook my head, "You may live your life in accordance to your own set of morals, but well. . . we're not talking a little civil disobedience any more. This is grand larceny. I mean, it's nice to think there are enlightened people that live a good life despite the laws, but I just don't think it's very practical for very long when you're committing major felonies. And you're dragging other people in on it now, I just don't know. . . Why did you even tell me any of this, Trowa?"

He sat back and looked away from me as he spoke, and I knew then my failure to understand him had come as a major disappointment. "Because I need off of the pedestal you placed me on, Quatre. I'm no saint. I'm not even remotely good. But I'm free and I can live with that." He then got off the couch and crouched down in front of it. He reached under it pulling a few of the wooden floor boards out and then a small chest about the size as a cigar box. He sat back down on the couch and pulled a key out of a drawer on the coffee table and opened the box. He showed me the contents.

"Drugs," I knew it before I even looked. What else would he hide under the floor boards? He had proved brave enough to hang a priceless painting in his café, I couldn't imagine he'd feel the need to hide too many things."I guess this is the night for revelations," I said to him.

"Yeah," he replied quietly. He then looked at me directly in the eye for a moment and I had the suspicion that even though he had been trying to jar me with just about everything he said to me that night, it was also important for him to let me know he was no hardcore addict. It was obvious with how articulate and deliberate he was that nothing there could be stronger than what occurred in nature, but he pressed the issue just the same. "It's nothing heavy. It's all natural. Some hash and marijuana. Nothing serious."

"Why?" I asked.

"It's relaxing and less hazardous than alcohol," he said lowering his head. He was keeping something from me, this much I knew. 

"Does Heero know?" I asked, rubbing my eyes, which had begun to burn and itch as though I had been awaken too early from a deep sleep.

"No," He shook his head. "Or if he does he hasn't said anything about it." I nodded to let him know I would keep his secret. I couldn't imagine that Heero hadn't figured it out by now, or that Trowa would lie about it if asked. But whatever silent agreement the two of them had reached, it was none of my business. I was not about to say anything. Maybe Catherine knew and that was what she was talking about. It certainly wasn't about the Degas painting. It would never be hanging up still if she knew about it. But I had finally stopped trying to figure out what was bothering Catherine. Anything that came out of his mouth since I arrived could have been it. Or none of it, and I shuttered at the thought that there could be more to be discovered.

I picked up one of the bags that had some shriveled up substance in it and showed it to him. "What is this?" I asked.

"Mushrooms," he said as he began to put the little bags back in his secret stash.

"Well, what's so special about dried mushrooms? Lots of people eat those. Relena puts them on her salads."

Trowa smirked at me. "Not these kinds of mushrooms." He looked at the bag in my hand for a moment in contemplation. "Though it might explain her utopian dream of absolute peace, love and happiness." He reached his hand out to me. "Give me the bag, I'm putting this stuff away."

"Well, I'd like to try it," I said. It stunned him. I knew it would. It stunned me too, but I was committed now and I wasn't going to back down.

"Quatre, give me the bag and you can forget I ever told you about this or the painting. You'll be happier if you do."

"Don't tell me what will make me happy!" I snapped at him. He could be so irritating when he acted like he knew everything about me. He had a calm arrogance about him at times that rivaled Wufei's more blatant type."You wanted to jump down from the pedestal you claimed I had you on? Well fine. Now I'm jumping down from the one you placed *me* on. That's only fair, right? I want to try these, and I am!"

"Quatre, give me the bag." It was a command, not a request, but at this point I don't think he was really angry. This was all just an act for him. He had to make it seem like he was concerned enough to want to stop me. I wasn't buying it though.

"Don't come a step closer!" I warned. "Or I'll eat the whole bag of them and then you'll have to explain me to Catherine and Heero." 

Trowa took a step back. "Quatre. . . don't be irrational. A moment ago, you thought you put them on top of salad. Give me the bag back."

"No," I was adamant. "And don't call me irrational, you seem to think they're so great, why should I be deprived of the fun? Now, how many of these do I eat?" I opened the bag and popped one in my mouth. It was perhaps one of the most vile substance I've ever eaten in my life. But I would be damned before I let him know I thought that.

"Please, Quatre--"

"How many, Trowa? Or I **_will_** eat them all!" I popped two more in my mouth. I thought I might vomit before I carried out my threat. I had really gone soft since the last war.

Trowa sighed and shook his head. He tried to look put out, but even then he only managed to look mildly amused. "Six or eight, but no more or you'll get sick. Put them in your pocket, we don't need the staff to see them on you" He grabbed his keys off the chest of drawers. "We're leaving. If you're going to eat those, we're going to an environment where you can appreciate them more." He then took me by the hand once again and led me out of the café to his car.

I got in his car and we drove out of the French Quarter and to some secluded spot along the banks of the Mississippi, which he said was ideal for optimizing the visual experience. He was quiet most of the way, only looking over to me every once in a while to make sure I didn't eat too many of the mushrooms. "It doesn't seem to be doing anything, Trowa." I finally spoke up in a little disappointment. "I don't feel different at all."

"It takes about thirty to forty minutes to take effect, Quatre." he informed me. "You'll notice it soon enough."

"Um. . . do you want any, Trowa?' I asked, handing the bag over to him now that I had eaten what I needed. I didn't mean to be rude, but I was afraid he'd take the bag off of me before I had a chance to really experience them. It was just something I had to do. I thought that maybe I'd understand Trowa and Duo a little better if I knew a little about this part of their lives. 

"No," he said with a faint smile. "I think tonight I'll just watch you." He was always so protective of me, I wanted to hug him. I wanted to kiss him, actually, but then I thought it might be the influence of the mushrooms and I didn't want to start something neither of us knew how to finish.

He drove a little while longer in silence and then looked over to me as I sat huddled on the passengers side waiting for the mushroom to kick in or for the authorities to pulls us over. "I lied before," he said to me. I looked back at him a bit confused. It was Duo's motto that he never lied, but I didn't believe any of us ever really lied. "I. . . didn't show you those drugs to take myself off any pedestal. I was wrong to say that to you."

"Oh, Trowa. . . it's okay, I guess I do have a tendency to idealize my friends and--"

"No, Quatre. . ." he cut in on me, "that's not why I did it. . . I don't use them to relax or for recreation." He stop speaking for a moment and returned his attention to the road. "I. . . have a condition. I was going to tell you about it earlier but. . . things progressed differently."

"Condition?" I looked over at him, anxiously waiting for him to tell me what it was. But he remained silent again. "Trowa. . . What is it? What's wrong?"

He gave me a cursory glace and trained his attention once again to the road. "Don't get upset or worried, Quatre. It's not too bad of a case. It's not fatal and it shouldn't slow me down too much."

"Trowa!" I was about to panic despite his attempt to calm me. For all his grace, Trowa was notable lacking in it when topics of conversation concerned him in a significant way. 

"I have a mild version of multiple sclerosis, that's all, Quatre. I'm usually fine, but sometimes. . . the stiffness in the joints or the neuralgia become hard to manage. I. . . don't like to take those prescription drugs, they make me too tired, or they don't ease the pain enough, so. . ."

"You take the marijuana," I finished for him.

He nodded. "It works better with less side effects." 

"And this is why Heero moved in and is driving you nuts with his over protectiveness," I added.

He nodded again and stared at the road intently. So intently I wondered if he was watching it at all.

"Does Duo know?" I asked.

"I don't know," he replied quietly. "Maybe. If Heero told him. I didn't say he couldn't and they're best friends. . ."

"Maybe that's why he took the wrap for you with the horses," I suggested.

"Mules," he corrected. "I thought of that," he said, and then he stopped the car near an isolated riverbed. "I think he would have done it anyway. I think he was jealous I thought of it first." He smiled a little at me and then unbuckled his seat belt. Funny the laws he choose to obey. He rarely ever used them while piloting his Gundam.

"Trowa," I placed my hand on his shoulder and stopped him before he could get out of the car, "is it really a mild case? Are you going to be okay? I can find a good neurologist for you. You know I have the money to--"

"Quatre, I'm not dying." He clasped his hand over mine and smiled again. "I'm just a little stiff and sore, I'll be fine. If it gets worse I'll tell you."

"Promise?" I wasn't sure he would even if he promised. Not that he would lie to me, but rather he, along with Heero and Wufei, had an amazing threshold for pain. I wasn't quite sure what he would judge as `worse'. 

"I promise," he said to me and squeezed my hand. I would have to accept it.

We got out of the car and sat down by the river. Dusk was upon us and the bright lights of the river boats were flashing and reflecting off the water. It was a beautiful sight. I could understand why Trowa wanted to take me there for this experience. We sat in silence again for a while, before I broke it with a gasp."

"Oh. . . oh, Trowa!" I shouted out.

He was immediately on me. He grabbed me by the shoulders and stared into my eyes. "What is it Quatre? Are you okay?"

"Oh. . . Trowa. .." I started laughing, I couldn't stop it. "I think. . . I think I'm going to be a talker!"

He settled back down on the grass and shook his head. "Quatre. . ." I think I even heard him laugh.

"Oh God, Trowa! Look at the river! Those lights! Those lights are spectacular!" It's hard to describe it in words, but it was magnificent. The lights formed in geometric patterns that sailed around the river leaving glowing trails, like something out of a fairy tale. Triangles and rhomboides and dancing decagrams and on and on. . . It was like sliding down a mobius strip with geometric strobe lighting. Trowa told me later that the mushrooms I took were specific to visual enhancers and not really mind altering on a deeper level, but that was just fine by me. It was gorgeous. He gave me my own supply of them before I left, which he said was to make space travel a little more interesting. And they certainly did. I couldn't see how they would lessen pain though. I guess you had to have pain to notice it.

As the night proceeded I just talked and talked. Trowa just listened. Or maybe he did talk, I can't really say I remember after the mushrooms kicked in. I went on about everything we had talked about that day. About Heero and stolen mules and why tea was superior to coffee and on and on. And I think I even had a revelation on the Degas painting. It suddenly all made sense to me then, what Trowa said about the true art of what Duo did and how the forgery in the museum would be worth far more then the real Degas - if anyone ever found out about it at least. It didn't bother me so much that he had the painting hanging up at the café. Mostly I understood what he meant about being free. I can't say that I was freed in such a way myself, or that I even agreed it was a good thing, but I think I understood what he meant. He was free. And I was happy for him that he could at least have that. 

  


  


  



	6. Winding Down the Day: Chapter 6

  


Winding Down the Day

  
_Stephanie_  
November 12, 2001

Part 6 

* * *

  


  


  


For the next few years, Trowa had not seemed to slow down very much. Though with my visits to earth restricted to three to four times a year, it was difficult to tell. Neither Duo nor Wufei reported any difference either, and Heero could not be reached for comment over the issue. Catherine, now married and the mother of two, lived uptown with her husband and was no longer privy to Trowa's life outside of 

the café, much to Trowa's relief. There was no doubt that he loved his sister, but I believe Trowa was ecstatic the day she found someone else to fuss over. And with the children, she had even less time to worry over him. That only left Heero with the honors, and the two of them seemed to have worked out Trowa's morning issues. At the age of thirty-five, Trowa claimed that his life could not be more perfect. 

There were minor changes in our lives, the regular type that come with age and further responsibilities, but nothing worth much note. Except for Wufei, who left his job with the Preventors to run for the Chinese seat in the Senate. He won, as all of us knew he would. But even that did not change much for us. We still gathered at the café a few times a year, and when we did, we put aside our work to relax and enjoy each others company. Life carried on, taking us down the road with it at a leisurely pace. The whole world seemed calmer. The fruits of the war we had fought so long ago were finally beginning to blossom. Fewer people gathered behind Trowa's café for food. That was perhaps the best sign.

Wufei and I had arrived together one mid afternoon in July. A server informed us that Trowa was in his office doing the book work and paying bills. We decided to take a seat and have some lunch rather than disturb him. As fate would have it, Monsieur Genet had dropped in for lunch as well, earning a piercing glare from Wufei from across the room.

"Wufei, don't say anything. Trowa asked us not to do that," I reminded him.

Wufei turned back to me and straightened in his chair. He tilted his head in Genet's direction and said, "Heero was right, he's dead weight in the Senate." He smirked and glanced back at the man. "Among other aspects of life." 

"Maybe, but _**someone**_ must like him. People vote for him," I said, though I'm not sure why I decided to defend Genet at all. Perhaps without Duo there to argue, a void needed filled.

"People vote for all sorts of nonsense. That is what lets dictators rise to power," he countered.

"_**You**_ got elected," I said and then quickly changed the subject back to the matter at hand when he turned his glare on me. "Still, we don't know everything there is about him. Maybe he was abused as a child, or didn't have good nutrition as a baby. It could be a bad chemical imbalance. Anything, really. Lots' of bad things happened during the wars." To this day I like to believe that everyone, even tyrants, deep down are good people. Perhaps if things were a little bit different, they would be something other than what they become.

"A bad childhood is no excuse for a bad adulthood." Wufei remained steadfast in his convictions.

"No. . . . no, it isn't," I agreed. "But Genet's doesn't really hurt anyone. He's just--"

"A waste of valuable space in the Senate that doesn't pay his food bills," Wufei finished for me. He looked backed at Genet, who was in the middle of an argument with a server over something being too cold. "Look at the man! He's at it again! I don't think he's *ever* paid for his food here."

"You're right, he never has," the voice of Catherine sounded behind me and I turned and stood to give her a hug. She was six months pregnant with her third child, and I marveled how she could even leave her air-conditioned house in late spring New Orleans.

"Monsieur Genet lives by a different standard than the rest of us," she shrugged. "But it's only a couple of dollars each time he visits. It doesn't seem worth it to make a fuss. Besides, I think most of the regular customers get a kick out of it now. He's a better side attraction than our ghost."

I pulled out a seat for her and we all sat back down. "See, Wufei? Something is coming of Genet's visits here. People enjoy watching his antics." 

"Hn," Wufei snorted and turned back to Genet. "I'm sure the servers love to deal with him."

Catherine laughed and looked over to the server now walking away with a bowl of soup that Genet had sent back. "We give them combat pay if they happen to wait on him." 

"How is this pregnancy going, Catherine?" I asked her, trying to get Wufei's mind off of Genet, whom he was still glaring at from the corner of his eye.

"Oh, I suppose it's going as well as can be expected. My feet are starting to swell, but the morning sickness was nonexistent this time around. I still can't believe I signed up to do this again. I said _**never**_ again after the first one." She laughed a little and shook her head. "How soon we forget."

I smiled and nodded. "Anna told me that after our first child. And I was in _**complete**_ agreement with her. I never wanted to see her in that much pain again. But then a year later she told me she wanted another. I was surprised at that. I even said no at first. I didn't want to put her through it. But she insisted and now . . . "

"Four kids later . . . " Catherine tsked at me. "Well, this is definitely the last one for me. Two is a handful. I'm not sure what I'm going to do with a third. You have all those sisters to help Anna."

Wufei turned away from Genet and looked at Catherine. "Your husband doesn't want any more?"

"Uh . . . " She looked at Wufei for a moment and back to me, "We've not really discussed it yet, but I think three is plenty, and it gets so much harder as you get older." 

"Your only thirty-seven, you still have a few years left," Wufei said, and my mind quickly jumped into gear as I noted Catherine's eyes narrowing on him, in what was most likely going to turn into a diatribe on how her reproductive business was none of his.

"You know, Catherine," I looked into her eyes, breaking her contact with Wufei, "the soup is positively the best I've ever had here. What is it called?"

She looked at me for a moment and arched her eyebrow, "Chicken noodle," she said.

Wufei was also giving me the look now. "You mean you didn't realize that?"

"Well, it tastes different!" I insisted. "It's really good. What all did you put in it?" I had unwittingly committed myself to discussing the soup, and I shocked myself with how inane I sounded even to my own ears. It was all Wufei's fault.

Catherine blinked. "Chicken and noodles," she said slowly. "As you can see, Trowa went crazy this morning and also added carrots and celery."

"Looks like there's parsley in there too," Wufei added.

"It just tastes really good today," I lowered my head and took another spoon of the soup. 

"Well," Catherine stood, "I'd love to sit and chat, but I need to get to work. Do me a favor and take this package up to Trowa, it was in the mail for him. I don't think I'm up to managing those steps right now." She handed me a package she had been holding under her arm, which I took. 

"Certainly, Catherine," I nodded. It was a small package wrapped in a puffy envelope, which seemed to hold a book inside. Trowa and Heero's walls were covered top to bottom in books. Their library rivaled the public one. They read each and every one of those books too and often asked us if we had read this book or that, making recommendations to us if we hadn't. 

We finished eating and I took a reluctant Wufei from his perch watching over Genet to go deliver the package to Trowa. 

He was sitting at his desk with his three-year-old niece on his lap. Her auburn hair, which was the exact same shade as Trowa's, was tied up in little pigtails. She was eating a jelly sandwich and getting it all over the papers on his desk. Trowa didn't seem to mind. 

"Hello," he said without looking up from his work. He never looked up if he was in the middle of something. Whatever Trowa was doing first always had his undivided attention, everything else was secondary unless it was on fire. "Grab a seat. I'll be a few more minutes."

I nodded and sat on the couch next to his desk, while Wufei chose to walk around the room and look at the book shelves. Bach's cello concerto was playing on the stereo and I nearly fell into a trance as I waited for Trowa to finish. It amazed me how quietly his little niece sat on his lap eating her sandwich. My children would have had all their toys pulled out, playing, squealing, screaming, the works. Duo's kids were like that too, though I guess it was expected they would be. Catherine's daughter was about the quietest child I ever knew. There was no doubt young Anastasia was going to take after her favorite uncle. And Trowa just doted on her. He gave the same amount of time and love to her older brother, but Jonathan seemed to like hanging around Heero and all his computer gadgets more. 

But Anastasia was her uncle's little girl. She loved music and had even started to take flute lessons from Trowa by then. She was quite remarkable for a three year old, though it was still advisable for those with sensitive ears to keep a safe distance. Trowa, as always, had amazing patience and Anastasia equaled him in persistence. A few years later, on the day of her first recital, Trowa bought her a new blue dress and a pair of shiny black patten leather shoes. The day she won her first competition, he bought her a beautiful white, silver tipped Himalayan kitten, which she named Calliope after the Greek muse of music (at Trowa's suggestion, no doubt). Today she is retired from the Boston Symphony, but still teaches a few students during the week. If only Trowa could have lived to see her perform . . . But I'm sure, somehow, he knows.

Wufei had decided to pick out a book and read as we waited for Trowa to finish. He sat next to me, and as he flipped through the book his nose wrinkled in disgusted. "I didn't realize you and Heero were . . . into . . . such things." He arched his eyebrow and gave Trowa a coded look, trying to remain non descriptive so that the young girl would not repeat unladylike words to her mother and tell her that Uncle Wufei had said them. 

Trowa looked at Wufei and then to the book on his lap. He smiled slightly. "Amazing. Of all the books, you manage to find that one. If I didn't know better, I might think the Senator was investigating my house."

I peered over Wufei's shoulder to look at the book. It was _**The Story of O**_*, and I must confess I had no idea what the story was about back then. I had to look it up later, as neither of them elaborated on the book past the innuendo that it was sexual in nature. 

"That is. . . your business, Trowa." Wufei smirked and set the book on the end table. "I find it hard to imagine Heero reading that, though I suppose it's not too shocking that you would."

"You seem to know enough about it, Wufei," Trowa said. He took off his glasses and stared at Wufei accusingly. "Was that research for your ethics committees?"

"I don't get involved with such trivial matters," Wufei snorted. "The book is a classic, everyone has at least heard about it." 

I remained silent on the matter, too embarrassed that I had never heard of it till then. "I've got a package for you," I changed the subject before I had to publically display my ignorance to them. "Catherine asked me to carry it up for her." I stood and handed him the package. He smiled at me and took it.

"Thank you," he said. He rearranged Anastasia on his lap, as she was beginning to slide off of it, and then grabbed his envelope knife to cut open the package. He pulled out the book and stared at it for a moment, admiring the leather cover and Japanese design on the front. It was obvious that the book was not commercially printed, but rather a hand written journal. He quietly opened it and again stared at the front page for a long moment. Whatever it was, it had changed his entire demeanor. He paled as he read the first page and for a moment seemed as if he had ceased to breathe. Then he began to rapidly flip through the book before setting it down closed on the desk.

"Quatre . . . Wufei . . . " he said quietly, "can you please take Anastasia down to her mother? I. . . might be here a while." 

I was surprised, but nodded. "Of course," I said. 

"Is everything all right?" Wufei asked before I could.

"Yes," he nodded. "Everything is fine . . . I . . .just need to go through this. I shouldn't be too long." 

Trowa had retreated to his cryptic ways, giving us no indication of what was in the book, but it was his business and we did not push. I walked around the desk and took Anastasia by the hand and led her out the door, with Wufei following close behind us. 

We waited for a few hours in the courtyard of the café until Heero finally arrived from an errand he had run, which for once did not involve posting bail for Duo. 

"Hi." He stood in front of us, already dressed for the night. We were to have dinner at The Commander's Palace, a posh little restaurant in the Garden District that Trowa and Heero both despised, but Wufei and I adored. We took turns choosing where we would dine, and since Duo cancelled on us the last minute to attend the Running of the Bulls in Pamplona, the Lucky Dog venders were thankfully not on the list of possible dinning establishments. 

"Heero, you look nice." He did too. There was usually an innate need that welled up from deep within me to shake Heero till all the wrinkles fell out of his clothing, but tonight he looked neat and well groomed. 

"Thanks. You're not ready yet." Heero leaned against the brick wall and crossed his arms, as though waiting for an explanation.

"Your better half kicked us out of his office about four hours ago. We're just waiting to hear from one of you, if it's not too inconvenient." Wufei leaned back on his chair and propped his feet up on the adjacent chair. 

"Hn. That's odd." Heero turned his gaze to the second story window that lead to Trowa's office.

"Well, he got some package. He kicked us out after opening it," I added. That seemed to make sense to Heero. He nodded.

"I see." He pushed himself from the wall and pulled out the chair that had supported Wufei's feet.

Wufei sat up, slightly annoyed, thought it was not clear if it was because Heero stole his chair when there was a perfectly empty one next to me, or that he chose to sit with us when Trowa was blatantly ignoring his guests. 

"Anything new in the Senate?" Heero asked Wufei. 

"Genet stole food from you today," Wufei told him

"That's not new," Heero said. 

"They introduced a new bill to ban light pollution after midnight in all major cities."

"Think it will pass?"

"No."

And they went on like this, the two of them. It was amazing to witness Heero and Wufei making small talk. It was understandable that they made it with others, especially with Wufei's new public career. Even for Heero, there is just no escaping it no matter how antisocial you are. But to see them make it with each other was wrong on **_so_** many levels. It was like pulling up a chair and watching a pitcher of ice cubes melt for entertainment.

My private thoughts are not always so diplomatic.

Unable to stand it any longer, I rose from my seat to dress for dinner when Trowa finally emerged from the café. I was about to address him, but was stopped by the strangeness of his presence. 

He had clutched in his hands the book that had arrived in the mail for him. His arms were folded around it and he held it to his chest. He did not look at me at all, nor did he seem to notice that either Wufei or I even there at all. His eyes fixed on Heero and he slowly walked to our table. He bore no expression on his face, but the way he gripped the book suggested he was protecting something of great importance to him - and that Heero was apart of it.

Heero and Wufei both rose, but neither said anything. Wufei backed away from the table, no doubt feeling as in the way as I was. Something very personal was passing between them.

Trowa stopped a foot from Heero, who bowed slightly and smiled at him. Trowa stared at him for a moment and then suddenly reached out to pull Heero into passionate kiss, the book caught between Trowa's arm and Heero's back. Heero's arms then wrapped around Trowa, and the outside world melted from their private existence.

Neither Wufei nor I quite knew what to do. Trowa and Heero did not make many public displays of affection. This was new territory for all of us. Wufei pulled me from the scene, as I could not seem to walk away on my own volition, transfixed at what was transpiring before us in the way pure raw emotions tend to stun us when face to face with them. 

Maybe it is because I am an empath that I was so paralyzed. I had never felt such an intensity before, and it was coming from Trowa and Heero, directed toward each other.

Wufei and I ate alone that night.

  


* _**The Story of O**_, by Pauline Réage

  


  


  



	7. Winding Down the Day: Chapter 7

  


Winding Down the Day

  
_Stephanie_  
November 12, 2001

Part 7 

* * *

  


  


  


Trowa and Heero took to traveling after that day in July. Trowa finally hired a manager and several assistants to look after the café. With the lightened burden, both he and Catherine spent less and less time on the daily operations of the business. For the first time in their lives, they did not have to work. 

With his newly acquired free time, Trowa decided he would like to travel. He had already seen most of the world, but that was in wartime. He wished to see those places again and what they looked like after two decades of peace. Heero more than obliged him, for Trowa confided to me in a letter that no sooner had he mentioned that he would like to get out of New Orleans for a time, than did Heero present him with a trip ticket for two months in Europe. And that was only the beginning. They would return home for a month and take off again the next to Russia, Alaska, Egypt and India. They stayed in Japan for half a year, and Heero studied the art of Japanese calligraphy of all things. And then they would go to Brazil and stay just as long, because Trowa loved that dialect of Portuguese. 

The two were joined together in a way they had never previously allowed themselves to be, and they did not seem to mind what the rest of the world thought about it. Something had been transformed in both of them and they embraced this change with open arms. Though outwardly they were still more quiet and reserved than Duo, Wufei and myself, it was merely their nature and not some sort of repression they could have been accused of years before. They sat closer together in public places, not caring if one leaned against the other a little or placed a hand on a knee. Occasionally at night, they would hold hands. You could tell when they looked into each other's eyes that there were no secrets kept between them and no desire left unfulfilled. They were completely in love and inseparable.

If we wanted to see them now and hold our reunions as we typically did about three times a year, we had to track them down first. It wasn't an easy task keeping up with them from the colonies, so Duo and Wufei took on the responsibility of tracking them. In those days latter days, we almost never met in New Orleans. While it was a nice change of pace, I must admit that at times I missed meeting in that little café where our peacetime friendship began. 

At times, however, they were impossible to find, as they jumped from one place to the next, usually on a whim, each taking nothing more than a backpack and not even Heero's most prized laptop - or his pocket computers for that matter. I was nervous for Trowa then. He had the multiple sclerosis to consider, and even if it was mild case and all under control, it worried me that he was pushing his limits with the constant travel. But then I knew Heero would never let any harm come to him, and Trowa himself was very practical all things considered. Still, I worried, and pressed Wufei when after a month they had not turned up - the only sign that they were still even on Earth came in the form of enigmatic postcards to Catherine to let her know that they were fine and should be home by Christmas.

After an entire season of failure in his search, Wufei finally just sent a message extending an open invitation to them to visit him in China whenever they could make it. "They're adults," he said. "And more than that they were Gundam pilots. They'll turn up when they begin to wonder who's bailing Duo out of prison while they're away. You're always in the colonies and they know _**I**_ won't." But a month later he reeled in the exhausted travelers, who claimed they had only recently received the invitation. When they finally reached Tripoli, Heero checked his mail at a cybercafé. They told him that they had begun their journey through central Africa and gradually made their way up to the Mediterranean. The day after finding Wufei's mail, they bought a ticket and headed to Beijing. 

I think Wufei always believed they had purposely evaded him, as he never quite accepted their story that Heero had left even his pocket computer behind. "And what if there was an emergency? What if there was a death?" Both replied that they would have known if something important happened, though neither bothered elaborating how and thus only fed Wufei's skepticism.

But Wufei extended to them every hospitality and insisted that make themselves at home in his estate. They were to stay and recuperate as long as they liked, which they took him up on as they remained with him in Beijing for nearly six weeks. They left in mid December to keep their promise to Catherine that they would return to New Orleans for Christmas. 

During their stay in China, Duo and I made arrangements to visit for a week.

We arrived together at Wufei's estate, which was simply the most gorgeous place on Earth I had ever visited. The main house was traditional in architecture. Five pagodas seeming to reach upward to the heavens, like the mosques and byzantine churches of old. In the back he had a garden of Ginkgo trees and bamboo, and countless other flowers and plants I didn't know the names of, but were nonetheless beautiful. There were stone and wood carvings of Chinese lions and dragons, and at the center of the garden stood a statue of the great Chinese master, Confucius. 

I could understand why Heero and Trowa wanted to stay. 

"Hey, thought ya could ditch us did ya?" Duo announced as soon as he walked though the door in a thunderous voice. Even if they hadn't all gathered at the door, they would have heard him. 

"Get in here and shut up," Wufei said, slamming the door behind us. "Must you make a scene everywhere you go?" 

"I'm not making a scene, Chang my boy." Duo looked around and whistled. "My, isn't this place posh. Looks like you made it in high society. I feel all Gatsby like, except, you know, we're in China."

Wufei glanced at Duo for a moment and then turned to me. "Let me take your coat, Quatre, and then I'll show you to your room."

"You're not going to take _**my**_ coat?" Duo asked in amazement, though they played the same game whenever they met.

"No," he said. I handed Wufei my coat and then turned to Duo and shrugged. Trowa and Heero stood off to the side, not intruding on the normal ritual that took place whenever Duo and Wufei got together. 

"Well, Duo is right about one thing," I said glancing at the two travelers, "you two certainly did a good job avoiding us the past few months."

Heero shrugged. "We're here now."

"Yeah, yeah," Duo waved him off. "But we thought you might be dead in some savage's cooking pot or something. You could have dropped us a note!"

"Some savage's cooking pot?" Wufei rolled his eyes. "I thought your political conscious-mindedness prevented you from using such imperialist terms."

"Lighten up man! It was just a joke!" Duo shook his head and jerked his thumb at Wufei. "Do you get this guy?"

"We didn't have the chance," Trowa replied, ignoring both Wufei and Duo to answer me. He looked at Heero and smiled. "We were . . . occupied. It was only a few months. We wanted to get away from everything."

"Well, yes, I can understand that." I smiled back at him. He looked thinner than the last time I saw him, but then, so did Heero. His skin was a golden bronze, however, and he looked radiant. He must have spent a lot of time in the sun. Heero still looked white and if I hadn't known better, I wouldn't have suspected he was even on the same continent as Trowa. But it was just sun-block. Heero, like many colonists, believed that the sun was a giant flaming ball of cancer waiting to happen. It must have unnerved him greatly to see Trowa throw such caution to the wind. But Trowa was born on Earth and didn't have the same hangups. 

After Wufei had hung up our coats and showed us to our rooms, we gathered in his sitting room to talk until it was time for dinner. We all caught up on what we were doing now and Heero and Trowa filled us in on their trip to Africa. Duo showed us pictures of his last art show in Milan, and the protesters picketing the jail after his arrest. 

Wufei thumbed through the pictures and then glared at Duo. "Why do these protestors follow you anyway? Do you pay them? And what the _**hell**_ is this sign I always see? 'The last war virgin'?"

Duo blinked. "No, I don't _**pay**_ them," he snapped. "They love me all on their own! And what do you mean you don't know what that sign means? It's perfectly obvious. Tell him, Quatre."

Everyone turned to me and I looked back to Duo with my mouth open. "Uh . . . well . . . I don't really know." I replied. I thought it was just a silly sign they carried around, more out of nostalgia than any real reason. 

Duo made a 'tsk' sound and turned to Trowa. "Well, then you tell them. You always understood me." 

Trowa shrugged. "I always thought it was one of those inane Americanisms I never bothered to learn."

Duo narrowed his eyes on Trowa. "I forgot. You hail from euro trash. Excuse me, Mr. 'Friend-of-Genet,'" He waved his hand in the air making a gesture of grandiose, "I'll not bother you now with my lowly American ass."

"It's a socio-political statement on war." Heero announced. We all then turned to him and waited for his explanation. "While the majority of people were prostituting themselves to the faction that would most likely protect them, you remained true to your cause and fought for the colonies, even when they deserted you. Thus you maintained your 'purity', while the rest of the world fell from grace. Though I'm not sure why you are the '_**last**_' war virgin while the four of us remain alive." 

"Hey!" Duo's eyes brightened. "That's exactly right! How did you know that, Heero?" He ignored the last part of Heero's statement, seeming too impressed that Heero was the only one of us to 'get it.'

"It was just a guess," Heero said. 

"Well," Duo said as he clapped his hands together and rubbed them. "I'm starved. Anyone up for dinner?"

"I think . . . I need to excuse myself tonight," Trowa said. "I'm . . . feeling tired. If you don't mind, I will say goodnight now and see you in the morning." 

Heero remained seated for a moment and watched Trowa. When he didn't move to get up, Heero stood, walked over to him and helped him to stand. We were all alarmed at this, as Trowa never displayed this sort of need before. But we didn't dare say anything to embarrass him. We merely spoke our goodnights and let Heero take care of him. "I'll be down in a few minutes," Heero said with a nod. And then he slowly lead Trowa to their room.

Wufei watched them leave and then turned back to us. He was worried, and when they were out of earshot, he told us so. Though Heero seemed to recover from his travels after a day of uninterrupted rest, Trowa seemed to have slowed down considerably. "He sometimes will sleep till noon. He doesn't walk at the brisk pace like he used to. All his movements seem slower, and sometimes he doesn't seem to be paying attention. I've had to repeat myself several times."

"Well, maybe he's still dazed from that whirlwind trip," Duo said. "The poor guy never had a chance to catch his breath. You know Heero, he's a superhuman! He doesn't always remember the rest of us are mere mortals. Besides, most of us never pay attention to you when you talk either, Wufei," he quipped, but we both knew Duo by now. He was worried too and he was trying to comfort himself. Wufei didn't even bother arguing with him. 

"I'll talk to him," I said. "Maybe he is just tired. Sometimes his joints ache or the neuralgia gets to him. He's probably still stiff and sore from the traveling. He'll be fine." But Wufei and Duo knew I was just comforting myself as well. 

When Heero returned we went to dinner, minus one from our group.

  


* * * 

  


The next morning I asked Heero if Trowa was feeling better and if it would be alright for me to talk with him.

"He's still in bed," he told me, "but he'll probably see you. Just knock first."

"Thank you." I smiled, then turned to head toward the room.

"Quatre," he said, catching me before I disappeared from view. "Don't keep him too long."

"No," I assured him. "I won't.

I knocked on the door and heard the muffled voice of Trowa on the other side telling me to enter. He was reclining on the bed, propped up with pillows that Heero had undoubtedly arranged to his comfort and he was reading the leather bound journal that he received in New Orleans. He set it down immediately as I entered. 

"I'm sorry I could not make it to dinner last night," he immediately apologized for his absence. "I was fine the day before, it just came on me suddenly."

"Please, don't worry about that," I said waving it off. I was far more concerned about his condition than altered dinner plans. I wouldn't go as far as to say he appeared frail, in fact he looked rather well, but there was an obvious strain in his eyes that betrayed his exhaustion. And it was the first time Trowa had ever allowed any of us to see him laid up in bed. This meant that he truly couldn't get up and walk around, and that scared me. He couldn't hide it if he wanted to, so he didn't even try. While part of me was glad he wasn't pushing himself to remain the stoic Trowa Barton, another part of me wanted to see him get up and do flips around the room, like I remember from his youth in the circus. Those days were so long past even then, but I remembered them and wondered where all the time had gone.

"It doesn't happen too often," he said, as though reading my fears and attempting to settle them. "It just flares up occasionally, and I have to stop and rest for a little while. I'll be fine again in a few days."

"This traveling, Trowa . . . did this . . . were you sick when--"

"No," he cut me off and shook his head. "It flared up a few times, but we would stop and spend a few days wherever we happened to be. I was no less comfortable there than I am here. So stop worrying." It was an order, and I think he would have been truly upset with me if I continued to worry in his presence. He knew I would as soon as I left the room, which I did, but he would be contented if I dropped the matter while I sat with him. Trowa hated being a spectacle unless he was performing, and it had been nearly twenty years since he had last performed. 

"I'm not worrying. I'm just . . . concerned." I said.

He laughed. "I'm pretty sure those are the same things, Quatre." I could tell he was trying not to laugh too hard because of the neuralgia. I worried about that to, but I tried not to let it show.

"No, they're not. They're completely different," I insisted. Not that he would be convinced. "They're totally different words. Worried implies the wringing of hands and heart palpitations, and . . . distress. But I'm just concerned. That's just like . . . raising an eyebrow. Totally different levels."

"If you say so." Trowa shrugged. But I amused him. I always had. More so than Duo, I think. "You know, between your innocence and your proclivity toward overwork and worrying, you're bound to drop dead of a heart attack from either shock or stress overload." He shook his head slightly and there was an attempt to raise his eyebrow, but the neuralgia prevented him from really doing so. It didn't stop him from trying though. His sense of humor was often twisted and a little morbid, but at least he had one. Wufei didn't. He always took himself very seriously, and couldn't stand the thought of anyone being amused at his expense. Heero understood the concept, but was never quite sure of when he was in its presence. Duo, of course, stood on the opposite end of Wufei and Heero. He would have shot back a jibe probably exceeding the level Trowa dished out.

I was somewhere in the middle, so I didn't take offense, but rather laughed in return. "I suppose I probably will. But I can't help it. I'm sorry."

"You're just Quatre, "he said, and he smiled at me, and it was a genuine and warm smile, but at the same time he looked so tired. "I have a good life, Quatre," he said suddenly, and I suppose he once again caught the worry in me. "I never dreamed it could be like this when I was young. I really thought I would die, and that suited me then. But after the wars, things changed. Despite my illness, I'm very grateful for this reprieve. You've been so much a part of that. Thank you. For all you've done." 

I shook my head, not believing that I had much of a role in any of it. "No. . . Catherine and Heero. They are the ones you should thank. What have I done?"

"The café, Quatre. And so much more." He looked at me and blinked, as though he could not believe I didn't know any of this. "Don't you see?" I tried to interrupt, but he kept on going, not allowing me to speak and seeming to know what I was going to say. "It wasn't just the money. There was more. You were angry with me . . . For not going to your wedding, for keeping my distance. And you had a right to be upset. When I finally did come to you, it was for money. You gave it without hesitation, even though I could tell you were still angry. You tried not to show it, but I could tell. You're full of such unconditional love, you won't even let justified anger stand in the way of it. It always made life easier to think that someone like you exists." He stopped for a moment and took a few shallow breaths. One long one would cause too many muscle movements in his face, and I could tell by watching his slightest gestures that he had learned to minimize the pain the best he could. "I wanted to draw you back into my life. But not partially. Not so that we would only see each other every so many years. I wanted your more permanent presence. A connection. When Catherine mentioned her dream of running her own business, I knew I found a way to do that."

I sat back on the bed, stunned by the words he told me. I had never thought he had come to my colony on L4 to visit me that day for my mere continual friendship. I knew it went beyond just asking for money, Trowa wasn't like that, but to hear his word as he spoke them that day made my heart nearly stop. Of all the years that I have lived, all the days I had mourned the lives of the people I had killed during the war and on the colony I attacked, nothing brought me so close to forgiving myself than to hear Trowa say it made his life easier to know I existed. That I made one life easier did not justify what I had done, but it helped me to reconcile myself with the past. 

"It's been an odd day, hasn't it?" he said, changing the subject, as no doubt the look on my face must have scared him into believing he had indeed managed to shock me and I might die of heart failure. 

"Odd day?" I shook my head, not sure of his meaning. "How so?"

"This life," he clarified. "It sometimes feels like it's been one long day that's finally winding down and at the point where I can finally look at the sunset and make sense of it . . . enjoy it . . . It's like I can suddenly see the larger picture and understand why it started off so bad. We spent the morning rushing and trying to put things in order the best we could, so that now we could relax before the sun falls."

"Winding down the day . . . I don't know," I said. I looked at him for a moment. There was a tightness in my chest and a sense of foreboding. "That sounds like an end is approaching. I'd like to think we have a while to go yet."

"We do," Trowa smiled again for me. "It's just dusk. There's still plenty of night for us." 

I leaned over the bed and kissed him softly. I'm not sure why, I simply felt a need and desire to do so. He looked so peaceful and content, and I found myself in love with him then. I kissed him again, more insistent, more urgent, more filled with passion than could be explained away by the first innocent and chaste kiss. He never protested, only parted his lips, allowing me in. When we broke apart naturally after the moment had passed, he leaned back against his pillow, looking up at me with half-closed eyes. "If anything more happened, you'd hate yourself later," he said. And I knew it was true. I would feel guilt over betraying my wife and Heero, both of whom I loved dearly. Though I could not deny that I loved Trowa, and always had. I think I knew from the moment he walked out of his Gundam and surrendered to me all those years ago. But we can't have everything and we make choices, and I have been happy and satisfied with my life, just as I know Trowa was happy and satisfied with his. I do not regret that kiss, however, nor would I take it back if I had the chance. There was something sacred in it, something I dare not go beyond, but beheld with wonder and a little bit of fear. 

"Would you, Trowa? Would you hate yourself too?" I asked.

But he only smiled and took my hand in his. A few minutes later he was sleeping.

  


  


  



	8. Winding Down the Day: Chapter 8

  


Winding Down the Day

  
_Stephanie_  
November 12, 2001

Part 8 

* * *

  


  


  


Life seemed to go on as normal after our visit to China. Heero and Trowa's traveling came to an end, and they once again settled into their lives in New Orleans. Trowa, however, slowed down considerably and left the daily run of the business to his managers. I thought at first that might upset him, but if he cared about it at all, he didn't seem to show it. He rather seemed to enjoy it and turned his attention to other things. 

He continued to encourage and teach young Anastasia the flute, and even taught some of her friends the art as well. In his eye, however, none surpassed Anastasia's talent for the instrument. I had to agree. The talent seemed to run in the family. Though Catherine was not Trowa's biological sister, their resemblance, and the resemblance between Trowa and his niece, was undeniable, right down to Anastasia's musical talent and her quiet nature. Neither Trowa nor Catherine pursued the point as they did not believe it mattered if they were blood related. They were family, and that was that. 

Trowa also began to paint, though he was never quite good at it. I don't think he cared. It was something that he enjoyed and it relaxed him, and that seemed to be enough for him. Heero framed everything though, and sometimes there would be a silent battle over what was hung for public view in their home, and what never left the privacy of Trowa's small studio. Heero found something wonderful with each one, and would go on about them to us at our reunions, like one might show friends endless baby photos of their children. Trowa would sit there awkwardly till Heero finished and then try to change the subject, which would never work, as by then we were all curious.

"They're just to help with my hand coordination," he'd say. "They're not very good, I'm afraid. I'm much better with music than the visual arts."

"But the vision," Heero would counter as he pointed to a piece. "Look at the emotion that spills out onto the canvas. There is more to art than just precision, Trowa." 

"I like it," I'd say lamely, which was not entirely true as I was more classically trained and Trowa's art was representative of abstract expressionism. It was a difference in taste, and since I understood his motivations, I felt no need to criticize.

"Well, it's certainly better than Maxwell's stuff!" Wufei always made it a point to say, but only if Duo happened to be present. "Maybe what it lacks in is direction. It seems to be emotion without content. It needs more of a shape, that's what I think."

"Oh, no, no, no, _**no**_!" Duo would shake his head. "Trowa, man, what were you _**thinking**_ when you mixed those colors together?" Heero would glare at him, and often I had to hold him back from saying anything. Trowa was color blind by then, an effect of the multiple sclerosis. Only Heero and I knew of this though, as Trowa did not want the others to find out. Occasionally, he'd lose complete sight in one eye, but that was never permanent to my knowledge. 

Trowa would merely shrug and then look at his work for a moment and then back to us. "I'm not really an artist," he'd say again, believing none of us must have heard him the first time. 

Sometimes he'd let Duo try to teach him when he would visit. Duo would be dramatic and tell Trowa that he had no form and that he didn't mix his colors the right way. Trowa would smile and tell Duo that he would try harder in the future, but he kept on doing things the way he always did them. Duo would simply shake his head. But it was all in fun, and I'm sure Duo got a kick out of teaching Trowa anything, as in the past Duo was sure Trowa, like Heero, was perfect in whatever he did.

Trowa seemed to have a special patience and love for Duo that not even Heero, who was Duo's best friend, could understand. I didn't quite get it myself until Trowa told me the story of the stolen Degas painting. Duo was simply the incarnation of a life well led to Trowa. He met every aspect of life on his own terms, and Trowa was endlessly fascinated with that - even if at times that made Duo overbearing and a 'pain in the ass', as Wufei would say. Trowa's quiet ways made it sometimes seem like he and Duo were diametrically opposed, but there was always something underlying Trowa's silence, and I sometimes wonder if the great difference between the two had more to do with style than disposition. 

For several years Trowa contented himself to teach music, paint, drink coffee, visit with us and live out his life with Heero. He seemed to have skipped middle age and gone straight into retirement, though he still looked as beautiful as ever. His auburn hair had streaks of grey, which began to show when he turned forty. He never tried to cover them up, but I was never sure if that was because he didn't care about such things, or the fact that he carried off the look of the distinguished gentleman quite well. He wore glasses instead of contacts, because he hated the feel of something inside of his eyes. Many tried to explain that he wouldn't feel them, but he had insisted that he would know they were there and that his glasses would do the job just as well. He had lines around his eyes that spoke of pain and laugher, but those too seemed in place. He grew older as he did everything else: with grace. 

His flare ups occurred with more frequency, sometimes leaving him bedridden, sometimes relenting enough to give him some mobility. I cannot imagine the internal hell it must have been for someone as active and flexible as Trowa to be so constrained by such a disease. But he never complained. 

On our last visit to New Orleans, it was Wufei who finally got up the nerve to ask him, "Does it bother you that your limbs and muscles are too weak to even walk at times? I don't think that I could . . . accept . . . such a fate as well as you have." 

Trowa smiled and shrugged. "I'd prefer not to have it, but there are worse things. I still have my mind and my family." And then he gave a cursory glance over to Heero and smiled wryly. "And my manservant. He gets me everything I need and he completes every small service with a smile. I'm very content with this one." 

Heero raised his eyebrow and simply replied with a "Hn." 

"I'd watch it, man," Duo warned Trowa. "You take too much advantage and one morning Heero's going to leave you in your bedroom with daytime TV blaring at you and no remote. Soaps and talk shows from dawn to dusk. None of that Animal Planet stuff you dig."

Trowa laughed. "Then it's a good thing I've been well lately. I'll have to make it up to him so he doesn't confine me to such a fate." And he looked at Heero, who was sitting next to him, with such a gentle and peaceful smile. A smile that said all the world was right before him and there was nothing more he needed. Heero smiled slightly in return and gave a slow, single nod, which Duo had once dubbed as his "as you wish" nod. 

It was Heero, I believe, that gave Trowa a reason to both fight and accept his condition. For the longest time, Trowa resisted the idea of Heero dedicating his life to him. He could come to terms with himself, but not when his illness would affect another. Not when it would affect Heero. He knew early on what it would mean: that eventually, Heero would have to give up a good part of his own life to taking care of him. But Heero was persistent and showed Trowa at every available moment that taking care of him was exactly what he wanted to do for the rest of his life. So when Trowa was well, he gave everything that he could to Heero to make up for when he wasn't. And when he was sick, he let Heero care for him without much resistance. That was the compromise he made, and I believe he eventually was at peace with it.

They could have lived forever together as things were. Each had come to accept what life had thrown their way. They grew accustomed to it and found their happiness despite it. But as with all other aspects of life, nothing stays the same and change invades our lives again and again. And so it would for Heero and Trowa one last time.

It is said that people live long lives with this disease. Trowa himself was constantly reminding us that it was more of a nuisance than anything else. It certainly was not fatal, and we were to treat him the same whenever we were around him. So none of us were prepared to deal with what would happen shortly after our last visit. 

One morning, late April in New Orleans, Heero had awakened and Trowa did not. He died in his sleep from a massive heart attack. There was a small hole in his heart, the doctor told Heero and Catherine. People can live their whole lives and never even know they have one, he explained. But with the weakening of Trowa's muscles it was too much of a strain and his heart finally gave out. He was only forty-seven years old. 

Heero was devastated. There had been no warning for him. Nothing to tell him that the only love of his life was going to leave him soon and he would have to go on without Trowa. I do not believe the thought ever occurred to him. For the first time in his life, Heero Yuy did not know what to do. 

It was Catherine who called us and Catherine who made all of the funeral arrangements. Despite our being Gundam pilots, I still feel that the women in our circle of friends were always the strongest. They were always there to pull together what needed to be pulled together, never minding how bad the situation was. When we had stopped fighting and our job was completed, it was Relena Darlian who drew the Earthsphere together under a peaceful world government. It was Lady Une who organized the Preventers, and Sally Po and Lucrezia Noin who kept it running. They picked up the pieces the men broke during the war and they mended them as best they could to keep everything running smoothly. And so it was with Catherine, who mended the hole in our hearts as best she could to keep those of us Trowa left behind running smoothly.

She proved to be every bit the stoic her brother once was, greeting each of us as we arrived, asking us how our trip was and how we were holding up. She would cry if she was left alone with her thoughts a little too long, but she never broke down. She'd find something else to do, make a fresh pot of coffee or comfort her children, and then she'd move onto the next thing. 

She kept a close eye on Heero, who seemed in too much of a daze to really notice what was going on around him. "Please help me watch him," she asked the three of us. We did without hesitation, though I believe each of us were in a daze of our own. Death was bound to one day separate us and one of us would have to be the first, this we knew, but the reality of it seemed unfathomable. In as much as Trowa was Catherine's brother, he was ours. We had lost one of our own. Not even war could separate us, so how was this possible now?

Duo was speechless. He approached Heero, taking the first watch as Wufei and I helped Catherine with the guests, and sat in the chair next to him in silence for the first hour. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see them both sitting in the parlor of Catherine's house completely inanimate. Heero was sitting up straight, face expressionless, though I could feel his heart breaking inside and confusion in his mind over how such a thing could have happened. Did he make a mistake? Was this **_his_** fault? Did he miss a sign that could have saved Trowa's life? His mind repeated the questions over and over in his mind. He was so lost, and my heart cried out in pain with his. 

Duo sat with his head lowered and his hands folded between his knees, and in him too, I felt a confusion and possibly a touch of anger at the loss. I expected this of Heero, but Duo surprised me. I thought that of all of us, it would be Duo that would handle this situation the best. He was always the strongest of us in spirit. But on the day of Trowa's funeral, Duo remained quiet, and for the first time I could see how truly alike both he and Trowa were. Both knew how to pause when the moment called for it. 

It was not until Wufei and I had joined them that Duo was finally moved to talk. Wufei made light conversation about some of the guests, commenting on how nice it was for Lady Une to show and that Zechs and Lucrezia brought such a beautiful flower arrangement, and wasn't it interesting that Relena arrived with Dorothy Catalonia to yet another event together. We all nodded and for a little while, Duo perked up a bit and joined in the light chatter. But when conversation turned back to Trowa, he became silent once again.

"It's too bad it happened in his sleep," Wufei said. "I think he would have like to have known it was going to happen. He would have wanted to prepare." 

I disagreed. I think Trowa would have preferred to go in his sleep, peaceful, and so far removed from his earlier violent life as a soldier. He was not like Duo or Wufei, who would fight death to the bitter end. Or like Heero, who would deny the possibility until the mission was completed. Trowa was always more accepting of whatever came his way, and in the end, he would bow out with grace and take his leave.

But I kept this to myself and remained silent. It really wasn't the time to discuss such things, so out of respect for Heero, I steered the conversation elsewhere. Wufei took the hint and dropped the subject. 

  


* * * 

  


After the funeral, Heero disappeared. His only parting words to us were those left on Trowa's tombstone. They read:

  


_The moon departs  
frost falls upon the  
morning glory_* 

  


In a way, more than Trowa died that April. It was an end of an era, for never would the five of us be together again. Heero's disappearance seemed to finalize everything. We all searched for Heero in a vain attempt to bring him home, but after a few years, it was obvious that we would not find him if he did not want to be found. He left not a single clue to his whereabouts. 

Life eventually went on for Duo, Wufei and me, and we tried to keep going in the face of our lost comrades. We continued to meet each other a few times a year and vowed not to lose touch. It was difficult in those first years, and often our meetings were punctuated by long bouts of silence and some times tears, but in time the pain faded and we found our selves reminiscing and laughing once again.

Duo still managed to get himself in trouble with the law, though he was not jailed so much anymore. Time seemed to mellow him, and his art transformed from political activism to self-introspection. Some say he lost his edge, but the more common analysis was that it had matured and that his most brilliant work was most definitely from his later period. 

Wufei's political life took new form when he found himself elected to the governor's seat over the nation-state of China. He seemed more surprised than we by the turn of events, but he took his new role seriously and with pride. He made his nation proud in turn by making it the first nation-state on the planet to completely eradicate hunger and poverty. He was called upon by Relena Darlian, who was then the presiding leader over the World Senate, to implement a plan that each nation-state would then follow. Wufei stepped up to the challenge. At the time of his death in 255, four years ago, not a single person on the planet or in the colonies, was hungry. I am told he died at peace in his bed with a smile on his face.

Nearly two years after that, word reached Duo and I that Heero Yuy had died in the L1 colony cluster, apparently of complications due to his age. He was found in his home, slouched over his desk with a pen in his hand and parchment under his head. His neighbors did not know who he was, as he went by the name Hakuto Sato. I do not know if he made it up, or if it was his true name. But they searched his house looking for information on his next of kin. What they found were volumes upon volumes of writings, which spoke of the Eve Wars, the early political campaigns during the first years of peace, his work for Relena, and his hopes for the continuing peace. 

Amongst all of his writings was the leather bound book Trowa had received in the mail so many years ago. It was still in good condition when it was turned over to Duo and I as per Heero's request should he die before us. We opened it together, not sure if we should dare such a thing. Both of us remembered how well Trowa guarded the book, never showing anyone the contents it held. But both he and Heero were gone now, and Heero wanted us to have the book, so we read it together.

On the first page, dated 197 AC, Heero wrote his first haiku for Trowa. The book was a collection of poetry from the years 197 to 215 AC, and all of poems were written for Trowa. Heero had been in love with him for years before they had officially become a couple. I finally understood why Trowa was so transformed by the book. What greater declaration of love could Heero make, then to give Trowa what had been written by his heart.

The haiku poems were masterworks, though not at first. The first few years were the clumsy beginnings of romantic ramblings. But as he went on, the poetry improved and the last five years were magnificent. Though from the look on Trowa's face when he first opened that book, he was equally impressed and in love with all of the poems.

More books were found in Heero's house, not all of them on war and politics. After his estate was finally settled and Duo and I were allowed access, we found that over half the books in his private archive were of poems written in Japanese calligraphy. Some were written on scrolls and hung on his walls. All of them, till is dying day, were written for Trowa. 

There were those who were shocked by the books of haiku poems, but those who really knew Heero were not: for the haiku is succinct and profound, and there was never a more perfect way to describe Heero Yuy. 

He was brought back to Earth to be buried beside Trowa, as was his wish. His final haiku, his epitaph, read:

  


_K ri toki  
yuku mizu kiyoshi  
mune kiyoshi _

Winter ice  
melts into clear water–  
clear is my heart** 

  


Gone was all the bitterness of losing Trowa. Heero was going home to him. And for that reason, I did not cry, nor was I sad for Heero Yuy's passing, but joyous that they would once again be together.

Now my own day is winding down and soon I too will be joining Trowa, Heero and Wufei. My heart is at peace and I find myself in growing anticipation of our reunion. Though I suppose in a way, Trowa never left me. He has been with me at every step, ever haunting my thoughts and my actions. When Duo and I are gone, his name may disappear completely, but his legacy of love, peace and common decency will live on in the works of the people whose lives he touched. The world has only a limited capacity for what it can remember, but the depths of its unconsciousness runs deep and the compassion and gentleness of Trowa Barton will one day surface again.

Duo still lives and somehow I find it difficult to believe that he will ever die. Perhaps as the God of Death he was handed down the fate of ushering the rest of us into the next world before he can join us. In many ways, he is much the same Duo he always was. His hair is as long as ever, still kept in a braid, only grey and wiry now. His age gives him the natural appearance of a demented mad man, refusing to grow old with any attempt at grace. "Quatre," he's told me many times, "there is no dignity in death. We are all food for worms and I am Shinigami. I must lead by example." He remains true to himself, and I cannot help but smile and think that Trowa would approve. When he finally leaves this life, a great force will have passed.

But for now, it is my turn to take my leave.

  


[From the memoirs of Quatre Raberba Winner, chapters 13 to 21] 

QRW, 180 - 260 AC 

  


~ finis ~ 

  


  
* Haiku by Kato.  
** Haiku by Hyakka

Both poems taken from :

_**Japanese Death Poems**_, compiled and translated by Yoel Hoffman. Singapore: Charles E. Tuttle Co., Inc, 1986. 

Note: I realize that by taking these poems, I might as well have copied Keats and given the words to Heero - but I have no talent for haiku, and in an effort for keep him from sounding like a complete idiot, I borrowed. My apologies to both Kato and Hyakka. 

  


  


  



End file.
